peisciii^s 

LOWSTOp 

BY  f&fX?iX*f)b 

HARRIET 
PRESCOTT 
SPOFFORD 


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DUKE 
UNIVERSITY 


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Priscilla's  Love-Story 


Priscilla's  Love-Story 


BY 

Harriet  Prescott  Spofford 

author  of  "a  master  spirit" 
"an  inheritance" 
"a  scarlet  foppy" 


HERBERT  S.  STONE  &  COMPANY 
CHICAGO  £sf  NEW  YORK 
MDCCCXCVIII 


COPYRIGHT,  1898,  BY 
HERBERT  S.  STONE  &  CO. 


THANKS  ARE  DUE  TO  MESSRS.  HARPER  AND  BROTHERS 
FOR  THE  COURTESY  OF  REPUBLICATION  IN  BOOKFORM 


Priscilla's  Love- Story 


I 

THE  sun  fell  through  the  row  of 
many-paned  windows  in  a  broad 
beam  over  Priscilla's  plants,  and  espe- 
cially over  a  crab-cactus  in  full  bloom, 
every  rosy  flower  of  which  was  like  a 
live  being,  with  the  shower  of  long,  yel- 
low, dusty  stamens  that  tumbled  out  of 
the  backward-bent  petals  all  alert  and 
listening;  and  the  room  with  its  warm, 
flowery  life  seemed  an  oasis  in  the 
great  snow  desert  of  the  hill  country 
outside. 

It  was  Priscilla  herself  as  much  as 
the  flowers  that  gave  this  room  its 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


summery  suggestion  —  the  tall,  fair 
creature,  with  nothing  slight  or  frail 
about  her,  but  moulded  like  a  young 
goddess,  with  large,  firm  curves;  with 
creamy  skin,  where  the  velvet  cheek 
was  only  less  carmine  than  the  glorious 
cactus  flower  on  the  shelf  above;  with 
yellow  hair,  whose  massive  braids, 
half-escaped  from  the  comb  just  now, 
had  fallen  on  her  neck ;  with  the  smile 
that  did  not  quite  break  to  dimples, 
but  warmed  the  deep  azure  of  the  gold- 
fringed  eyes  till  their  glance  was  itself 
at  once  a  smile  and  a  caress. 

But  if  that  glance  were  a  caress,  it 
was  all  the  caress  she  gave,  except  for 
the  motion  of  that  lifted  hand  on  the 
long  hanging  spray  of  the  cactus. 
With  all  her  bounteousness  of  aspect 
a  singular  reserve  was  mingled,  which 
if  it  filled  Jerome  Salter's  heart  with 

2 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

longing,  filled  him  also  with  dismay. 
He  was  not  quite  ready  to  ask  this 
beautiful  girl  to  be  his  wife,  but  he 
was  quite  ready  to  prevent  her  be- 
ing the  wife  of  any  one  else — that  great 
out-door  fellow  of  a  George  Pastner, 
for  instance,  with  the  vast  farm  and 
game-preserves  in  the  hills  beyond. 
As  for  Jerome,  he  was  yet  in  college, 
and  his  fate  depended  on  an  uncle  who 
had  other  views  for  him,  who  was 
waiting  to  take  him  to  Europe  on  his 
graduation,  to  show  him  the  world  and 
the  ways  of  the  world,  to  initiate  him 
into  something  that  Jerome  called  life 
— the  pleasure-loving  fellow  that  he 
was,  only  too  ready  for  this  gay  fu- 
ture; a  slender  youth,  with  a  certain 
dark  beauty  of  his  own,  and  who  had 
perhaps  attracted  Priscilla  by  her 
necessity  of  pitying  everything  that 
3 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


seemed  weak  and  needing  to  be  made 
strong. 

Not  that  Priseilla  was  aware  of  this; 
few  people  would  have  thought  of 
pitying  Jerome  Salter.  It  was  only 
that  the  truth  in  her  nature  was  as  il- 
luminating as  a  sunbeam ;  and  yet  the 
pity  from  which  love  springs,  and  into 
which  love  resolves,  was  so  all-unsus- 
pected by  her  that  she  thought  it  was 
herself  for  whom  she  felt  it.  Indeed, 
when  she  glanced  at  Jerome,  and 
caught  the  glow  of  his  dreamy  eye 
beneath  the  thick  black  lashes,  saw  the 
droop  of  the  full  lip  beneath  the  triste 
mustache,  saw  the  color  mount  and 
flash  and  fade  on  the  tawny  cheek, 
and  heard  that  low  voice  whose 
every  tone  had  an  inner  thrill  like  mu- 
sic, and  felt  her  own  heart  flutter  and 
sink  and  all  her  nerves  grow  tenser,  she 
4 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


knew  that  it  was  she  and  not  he  who 
was  to  be  pitied.  Why  had  she  ever 
let  herself  go  in  this  way?  Why  had 
she  not  waited  to  be  wooed  before  she 
was  won?  Why,  why?  And  anger 
with  herself  reacted  as  if  she  were 
angry  with  him,  and  made  her  answer 
him  briefly. 

"Curt  and  to  the  point  as  a  Greek 
chorus,"  said  he,  leaning  his  arm  on 
the  high  shelf  and  overlooking  her. 
Priscilla  knew  nothing  about  Greek 
choruses.  "Are  you  troubled?  Is 
anything  the  matter?"  he  demanded. 

"Nothing." 

"Nothing?  You  are  not  apt  to  let 
nothing  bring  you  to  naught.  Are 
you  ill?"  he  asked,  when  she  did  not 
smile. 

"Do  I  look  ill?"  and  she  turned 
with  her  proud  calm  air. 

5 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"No,  by  Jove!  You  look  the  incar- 
nation of  boundless  health  and  beauty. 
Now  what  are  you  angry  about?"  as 
she  turned  again  as  quickly.  ' '  Is  it — 
Priscilla — -because — because  I  spoke  of 
going  away?"  he  urged,  in  a  gentler 
tone. 

*' '  Because  you  spoke  of  going  away  ?' ' 
she  answered,  slowly.  "Really,"  with 
half  a  shrug,  "  what  is  it  to  me  whether 
you  go  or  whether  you  stay?" 

"Apparently  not  anything." 

"Oh,  no.  That  is  not  kind,"  said 
Priscilla.  "I  am  very  glad  you  should 
have  the  chance.  I  think  it  is  very 
good  of  your  uncle  —  for  I  don't  be- 
lieve he  is  quite  satisfied  with  what  you 
have  done." 

"Now,  Priscilla,  how  do  you  know  he 
is  not  satisfied  ?  Because  you  think  so 
poorly  of  me  yourself?" 

6 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"I  never  said  I  thought  poorly  of 
you,"  faltered  Priscilla,  looking  down. 

"But  you  think,  with  the  talents  I 
have,  I  ought  to  be  valedictorian  in- 
stead of  wasting  my  time  writing  love- 
songs  and  coming  out  nowhere.' 

' '  I  never  said  so, ' '  said  Priscilla  again. 

"No,  not  you,  no!  Some  things  go 
without  saying.  Well,  it 's  of  no  con- 
sequence. I  never  heard  of  a  valedic- 
torian in  his  class  ever  doing  anything 
else;  did  you?  If  I  get  the  degree 
anyway,  the  others  may  have  all  that 
comes  with  the  summa  and  the  laude. 
What  shall  I  care  about  that  when  I  am 
rocking  among  the  Hebrides ;  wThen  I  am 
mooning  in  a  gondola  round  the  water- 
ways of  Venice;  when  I  am  simmer- 
ing up  the  Nile,  and  finding  life  sweet 
in  the  shadow  of  old  temples;  when 
I  am  in  Greece,  all  sea  and  sky,  and 
7 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

the  spirits  of  old  heroes,  old  poets, 
old  beauty?  Oh,  I  say,  Priscilla," 
walking  up  and  down  the  room  now 
with  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  "how 
flat  it  seems  to  talk  of  going  through 
all  that  alone!  What  should  I  care 
for  the  miles  of  sea  and  foam  round 
Fingal's  Cave  without  you  along;  for 
the  Lido,  for  Philae,  for  blue  Galilee? 
No,  no ;  prensus  in  jEgio  without  you 
— it  would  be  simply  banishment  and 
punishment!  I  would  rather  fag  on 
here  forever  and  go  without  Europe — " 

"And  your  uncle's  fortune?" 

"Priscilla,  I  believe  you  love  money 
more  than  I  do." 

Priscilla  made  a  backward  movement 
of  her  wrist  that  was  half  an  accusa- 
tion. It  said  for  her,  "How  do  you 
dare  say  a  thing  so  false,  when  you 
know  I  am  in  this  low  room,  with  its 
8 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


braided  mats,  its  homespun  curtains, 
its  sketches  of  my  own  pencil,  its  rude 
chairs  and  lounges,  because  I  do  not 
love  money,  because  I  have  loved  you 
better  than  money!" 

"Oh.,  I  know,"  responded  Jerome. 
"What  a  tragedy  queen  you  are,  Pris- 
cilla!  You  ought  to  go  on  the  stage. 
Lady  Macbeth,  that  Scottish  thane's 
wife,  should  have  been  blonde  and 
sumptuous  like  you.  Oh,  I  know  you 
could  leave  this  any  day  for  George 
Pastner's  lodge  in  the  wilderness,  the 
palace  that  it  is!  Great  Scott!  I 
do  n't  see  why  you  do  n't." 

She  looked  at  him  a  moment, 
startled  out  of  her  enforced  calm;  and 
then,  in  spite  of  herself,  the  tears 
swam,  and  made  her  blue  eyes  as  ten- 
der and  divine  as  twilight  heaven,  as 
she  sank  into  the  low  chair  at  hand. 
9 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


And  in  another  moment  he  was  on  his 
knees  beside  her,  with  his  arms  lifted 
about  her,  drawing  her  over  towards 
him,  kissing  her  passionately,  bursting 
into  a  great  sob  of  joy,  and  laying  his 
head  on  her  breast. 

It  was  characteristic  of  Priscilla  that 
at  that  moment  she  clasped  her  arms 
round  him  and  held  him,  and  bent  her 
head  over  him,  not  like  a  sweetheart, 
but  like  a  mother.  And  then  he  had 
lifted  his  face,  with  the  tears  on  it  still, 
was  kissing  her  throat,  her  cheek,  her 
lips. 

"My  God!"  he  said;  "you  are  so 
beautiful." 

His  words  hurt  Priscilla  a  little  even 
in  that  throb  of  ecstasy.  She  took  his 
face  in  her  two  hands  and  held  it  off  a 
space.  To  her  that  was  the  most 
beautiful  thing  in  heaven  or  on  earth. 

IO 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


But  she  would  not  have  said  it.  Love 
was  so  far  beyond  beauty. 

"I  love  you  so,"  she  said. 

And  then  there  came  a  sound  over- 
head as  of  the  pushing  back  of  chairs  and 
of  restless  feet  going  back  and  forth; 
and  other  feet,  slower,  heavier,  that  had 
something  like  the  tread  of  a  soldier, 
George  Pastner's  feet,  came  down  the 
stairs,  and  the  door  opened  and  closed 
behind  them. 

"Oh!"  cried  Priscilla,  drawing  back, 
"I  have  done  wrong!"  And  then  her 
head  fell  forward  on  her  lover's  shoul- 
der, and  rested  there. 

How  sweet  to  live  thus  forever! 
Just  to  rest  and  feel  his  presence,  to  be 
filled  and  surrounded  with  his  love,  to 
ask  no  more  of  fate!  If  this  moment 
were  but  eternity!  Then  the  steps 
overhead  made  themselves  felt  through 
ii 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


all  the  sweetness  of  the  dream,  swift, 
eager  steps,  in  narrow  space — so  some 
madman  might  walk  to  and  fro  the 
length  of  his  chain,  some  creature  in 
its  cage.  She  lifted  her  head  and  her 
lover  saw  that  she  had  grown  very  pale. 
"I  do  n't  know  what  to  do !"  she  said. 
"I  do  n't  know  what  to  do!" 

If  Jerome  Salter  felt  at  that  instant 
that  he  also  did  not  know  what  to  do, 
now  that  she  had  confessed  all  he  had 
longed  for  and  implored,  if  even  in  the 
deliciousness  of  this  the  first  time  he 
had  ever  touched  her  lips  or  put  his 
arms  about  her  or  won  from  her  any 
expression  of  her  love,  he  was  aware 
that  he  had  gone  further  than  he  had 
a  right,  than  was  best  for  him  as  yet, 
he  had  no  time  to  echo  her  words,  for 
the  steps  came  bounding  down  the 
stairs,  and  there  was  only  an  instant  in 

12 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


which  to  start  to  his  feet  and  stand 
leaning  against  the  shelf  as  before, 
when  the  door  quickly  opened,  and 
there  came  in  a  person  whom  you 
might  have  taken  for  a  child,  a  beau- 
tiful child;  but  who  at  another  glance 
it  was  evident  was  a  youth  of  twenty- 
one  or  two,  whose  face  was  as  precise 
a  counterpart  of  Priscilla's  as  delicate 
health  and  its  nervous  peevishness,  a 
stronger  intellect,  a  different  sex,  could 
allow;  but  whose  body  was  the 
dwarfed  and  deformed  shape  of  a  boy 
of  twelve.  He  was  Priscilla's  twin 
brother,  Geoffrey,  and  there  existed 
between  them  the  tie  that  always  gives 
twin  children  a  part  of  either' s  life, 
and  which  was  made  closer  from  the 
fact  that  he  had  never  been  well  from 
his  birth,  so  that  Priscilla  felt  that  she 
had  absorbed  into  her  own  abounding 
13 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

being  all  his  portion  of  strength  and 
vitality. 

She  had  not  attempted  to  move,  as 
Jerome  had  done,  but  still  sat  slightly 
bent  forward,  a  glow  like  the  blush  of 
a  rose  mounting  and  suffusing  all  her 
face;  and  as  Geoffrey's  eyes  fell  on  it 
the  scorn  pictured  in  his  rapid  glance 
was  such  that  one  asked  if  all  the 
sweetness  of  nature  had  been  absorbed 
by  Priscilla  too,  and  left  him  only  in- 
tellectual force  —  force  thwarted  and 
frustrated  by  his  physical  misfortune, 
and  likely  to  become  only  bitterness  of 
soul.  He  gave  Jerome  a  short  word, 
taking  no  notice  of  the  cushions  that 
the  latter  sprang  to  shake  up  in  the 
arm-chair,  but  standing  with  his  hand 
on  the  open  door,  as  if  awaiting  the 
other's  departure. 

1  'This  is  quite  contrary  to  our  un- 
M 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


derstanding, "  he  said,  his  head  thrown 
back.  And  dwarfed  and  hunched  as  he 
was,  he  was  quite  the  master  of  the 
situation. 

"I  suppose  one  may  be  allowed  to 
tell  good  news  and  to  say  farewell  to 
his  friends  and  acquaintances —  " 

"Farewell!"  exclaimed  Priscilla. 

Jerome  laughed.  His  dark  and 
splendid  face  was  full  of  joy  and  tri- 
umph. "For  to-day,"  he  said,  and 
bent  and  raised  her  fingers  to  his 
lips,  and  crossed  the  room  and  laid 
his  hand  on  Geoffrey's  shoulder,  at 
first  as  if  he  would  bend  tenderly  to 
a  girl,  and  then  as  if  he  would  wheel 
him  round  angrily,  and  thought  better 
of  it,  and  laughed  gayly  and  was  gone. 

"I  see  it  all,"  said  Geoffrey  then. 
"This  is  just  once  too  often.  Oh,  if 
he  wasn't  so  enticing  a  scamp,  so 
15 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


sweet  a  manner,  so  '  bad  and  mad  and 
sad'  a  rogue!  If  I  didn't  love  him 
more  than  you  do  yourself!" 

"I?"  murmured  Priscilla,  faintly. 

"More  than  you  think  you  do,  let  us 
say,"  said  the  dwarf,  climbing  and 
settling  himself  in  the  arm-chair,  tall 
then  among  his  cushions.  "For  if  you 
really  cared  for  Jerome  Salter,  Pris- 
cilla," he  said,  with  a  flash  of  the 
eyes  that  were  a  shade  less  blue  than 
the  sky-beams  of  Priscilla' s,  "you 
would  never  let  him  risk  his  future,  the 
development  of  his  talents,  all  his 
chances  at  fortune  with  his  uncle's  ap- 
proval, on  the  rock  of  a  premature 
love-affair,  a  penniless  wife." 

"Do  you  think,  then,"  faltered  Pris- 
cilla, "that  success,  gratified  ambition, 
money  in  hand,  are  so  much  more 
worth  than  love — just  love?" 

16 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"  That  for  love — just  love  !"  said  the 
little  despot  in  the  arm-chair,  snapping 
his  fingers.  "Do  you  remember  Ro- 
meo in  love  with  Rosalind  just  before 
Juliet  makes  fate  for  him?  Do  you 
suppose  Jerome  Salter^  going  out  in 
the  world,  will  not  be  terribly  ham- 
pered by  a  Rosalind  that  clings — " 

"We  have  been  all  over  this  so  often, 
Geoff,"  she  said,  wearily. 

"And  shall  have  to  go  all  over  it  as 
many  times  more,  if  the  folly  holds 
out." 

"Very  well,  then,"  said  Priscilla, 
gazing  steadily  at  him.  "I  mean  that 
it  will  hold  out,  if  you  call  faithfulness 
folly.  Jerome  will  no  more  change 
than  I,  and  the  sun  will  fall  from 
heaven  before  I  do." 

"Before  you  fall  from  heaven.  Well 
put.  Before  you  fall  from  a  fool's 
17 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

paradise.  In  the  name  of  goodness 
what  is  this  love,  this  infatuation? 
Why  are  you  willing  to  leave  me,  your 
own  other  self,  born  with  you,  more 
than  born  with  you,  bred  with  you, 
a  part  of  you,  for  this  fellow  whom  you 
never  saw  till  three  years  ago?  Yes, 
yes  —  enchanting  fellow  —  whole  and 
hale,  I  know;  not  the  broken,  ruined, 
half-made-up  thing  I  am.  Yet  still  it 
seems  to  me — I  flatter  myself,  doubt- 
less—  that  I  am  something  better 
worth." 

"Oh,  Geoffrey  darling,  don't  you 
see — it  is  n't  a  question  of  worth — it — 
it  's  something  of  nature — you  cannot 
help  it — it  comes  just  as  the  sun  comes 
up  in  the  sky!" 

"Why  does  n't  it  come  to  me  then? 
Oh,  you  needn't  speak!  I  will  spare 
you  the  trouble  of  saying." 

18 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"Oh,  Geoffrey!" 

"There,  there,  Priscilla!  I  suppose 
no  one  was  ever  born  with  less  tact 
than  you  have.  I  suppose  it  would  be 
impossible  for  any  one  to  make  me 
feel  my  misfortune  more  frequently 
than  you  do — " 

"Oh,  what  have  I  said,  what  have  I 
done,  Geoffrey?"  turning  towards  him 
with  outstretched  hands.  ' '  You  know, 
you  must  know,  I  never  thought  of  it. 
You  have  n't  any  misfortune  in  my 
eyes.  When  I  look  at  you  you  are 
perfectly  beautiful — ' ' 

"I  haven't  any  misfortune?  It 
takes  a  man's  sister  to  say  that,  who 
sees  him  crippled,  shapeless — " 

"Oh,  Geoffrey!"  exclaimed  Pris- 
cilla, springing  to  her  feet,  "I  believe 
you  are  driving  me  wild." 

"I  driving  you  wild?"  But  the 
19 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


door  had  closed,  and  Priscilla  had  es- 
caped; and  escaped,  as  Geoffrey  meant 
she  should,  with  a  very  decided  diver- 
sion from  the  recent  preoccupation  of 
her  mind. 

Geoffrey  waited  a  little  while,  and 
then  he  let  himself  down  laboriously 
from  his  chair  and  went  to  the  piano 
— Priscilla  was  the  music-teacher  of 
the  little  town  suburban  to  the  college 
town,  giving  lessons  even  to  some  few 
of  the  students,  of  whom  Jerome  had 
been  one- — and  he  began  to  play  at  first 
the  broken  chords  of  his  own  fancy, 
and  then  the  wild  measures  of  the  Peer 
Gynt  dances  over  and  over,  as  if  he  re- 
joiced in  the  bitter  mockery  of  the  un- 
canny music,  as  if  he  danced  there  with 
his  fellow  gnomes  and  trolls;  and  at 
last  the  mad  merriment  of  Chopin's 
Tarentella.  Priscilla  heard  him  where 
20 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


she  lay  sobbing  in  her  little  room,  and 
listened,  unable  to  reconcile  her  per- 
plexed emotions,  to  untangle  the  coil 
of  her  pity  for  Geoffrey  and  her  love 
for  Jerome.  Her  thoughts  had  gone 
far  away  with  her,  and  she  started  as 
if  she  had  been  asleep ;  and  then  she 
was  aware  of  a  softer  note  in  the  mu- 
sic, although  it  seemed  to  be  filling  the 
air  and  throbbing  all  about  her. 

Geoffrey  was  still  playing,  but  what 
different  strains;  utterly  sad,  heart- 
broken, complaining  minors  of  his  own, 
the  air  of  Schubert's  "Wanderer," 
fragments  of  the  Tristan  und  Isolde 
music — when  Priscilla,  with  her  tear- 
swollen  eyes  hidden  by  her  veil,  came 
down  and  went  out  to  her  scholars, 
leaving  him  to  a  sort  of  revel  in  sor- 
row, playing  himself,  indeed,  into  a 
mood  of  exceeding  happiness  with  the 

21 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


all  unutterable  beauty  of  parts  of  the 
Sonata  appassionata.  She  was  coming 
home  from  her  lessons,  tired  by  one 
dull  girl' s  heavy  fingers  and  stolid  brains, 
saddened  with  another's  facility,  feeling 
her  breath  come  quickly,  almost  to  suf- 
focation, with  the  remembrance  of  her 
love  and  joy,  with  the  vision  of 
Jerome's  face  before  her  mind's  eye, 
feeling  a  weight  of  terror  settle  on 
her  as  she  drew  nearer  to  Geoffrey 
and  his  anger  and  his  sorrow  and  the 
ever-fresh  and  present  need  of  her 
compassion.  Life  was  so  hard  for 
Geoffrey,  all  experience  so  bitter. 
When  he  saw  the  college  youths  in 
their  vigor  of  comeliness,  himself  crip- 
pled and  set  apart,  his  nature  had 
bade  fair  to  grow  as  warped  with  envy 
and  indignation  as  his  body  was  with 
deformity;  and  now,  conscious  of  great 

22 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


powers  paralyzed  by  poverty,  and  see- 
ing Jerome  win  away  from  him  the  one 
thing  in  the  world  he  had  to  love — 
what  could  be  more  bitter?  "Oh, 
poor  Geoffrey !"  she  cried  out,  sharply, 
as  she  went  her  way.  -  -  Poor  Geoffrey ! ' ' 
The  brook  was  roaring  along,  black 
in  its  icy  borders  below  her  and  beside 
her  as  she  went ;  the  sunset  was  paling 
with  rich  pomegranate  hues  over 
long  fields  of  snow  in  the  gap  of  the 
mountains;  a  star  came  trembling 
out  there,  and  then  a  thin  scarf  of 
cloud  blew  over,  and  a  young  moon 
hung  like  the  petal  of  a  flower  dropped 
from  some  mighty  hand,  and  was  gone 
in  the  great  shadow  below  that  held 
the  coming  storm.  There  was  a  soft 
crystalline  darkness  in  the  air,  and  no 
sound  in  the  universe,  it  seemed,  but 
that  of  the  tinkle  of  the  brook  and  the 
23 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

crisp  snow  under  her  feet,  when  she 
heard  the  galloping  of  a  horse  down 
the  bridle-path.  She  knew  it  was  Mr. 
Pastner's  horse  before  his  great  black 
shadow  fell  upon  the  air  as  he  stopped 
at  her  side  and  his  rider  threw  himself 
off,  and  holding  the  bridle  on  his  arm, 
went  along  with  her.  He  looked, 
towering  beside  her,  as  large,  as  pow- 
erful, as  the  creature  whose  head  was 
over  his  shoulder.  His  presence 
seemed  the  one  thing  she  could  not 
bear.  "You  must  let  me  go  with 
you, ' '  he  said.  "  It  is  surely  unsafe  for 
you  at  this  hour  alone.  And  I  have 
an  errand  with  Geoffrey  concerning  the 
model  —  some  nuts  and  bolts  that 
he  has  found  necessary." 

"Oh,  the  model,  yes."     How  she 
hated  that  model,  its  senseless  brass 
and  steel!    She  had  felt  from  the  be- 
24 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

ginning  that  she  was  to  be  crushed  in 
its  grasp  at  last.  And  yet  it  was  Geof- 
frey's soul  that  was  shut  up  in  it;  she 
could  not  help  furthering  it  and  be- 
ing fascinated  by  its  promise.  But 
she  said  no  more. 

She  had  intimated  to  Mr.  Pastner, 
in  every  way  she  knew,  that  it  was 
useless  for  him  to  seek  her  directly, 
and  she  wished  him  to  understand 
that  it  was  equally  useless  to  seek 
her  through  any  interest  in  Geoffrey 
and  his  model.  She  rebuked  herself 
for  that ;  she  knew  that  his  friendship 
for  Geoffrey  would  have  been  the 
same  had  she  not  existed.  But  a  de- 
fiant mood  came  and  overpowered  the 
mood  of  perplexity ;  the  very  presence 
of  Mr.  Pastner  brought  it.  Doubt  and 
trouble  spread  their  wings  to  fly  away ; 
the  fact  that  this  man  existed  made 
25 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


doubly  vivid  to  her  the  existence  of 
Jerome  and  his  love.  Why  should  she 
sacrifice  both  herself  and  Jerome  to 
Geoffrey's  ambition?  Let  him  be  happy 
some  other  way ;  they  could  see  to  that. 
All  that  she  wanted  now  was  to  be 
alone  with  her  memory  of  the  morning, 
still  to  feel  the  touch  of  those  lips,  still 
those  arms  about  her,  still  to  hear  that 
low  voice,  still  to  let  all  her  soul  go  out 
in  this  vivid  new  phase,  this  vital  ex- 
perience of  love. 

Mr.  Pastner  left  his  horse  under 
cover,  and  followed  her  in,  going  di- 
rectly where  the  light  shone  in  Geof- 
frey's work-room,  which  he  had  left  at 
an  earlier  hour;  for  he  seemed  to  be 
almost  as  much  interested  in  that  in- 
vention on  which  Geoffrey  was  spend- 
ing the  strength  of  his  poor  life  as 
Geoffrey  was  himself. 

26 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

Priscilla  put  away  her  wraps,  and 
went  into  the  sitting-room  to  rest  by 
the  low  fire  in  the  dusk  there,  still  with 
her  mood  of  joy  upon  her.  It  was  not 
for  any  long  time,  however,  that  she 
could  let  this  luxury  of  happiness  fill 
and  feed  and  warm  her,  Mr.  Pastner 
came  down  and  went  out,  and  Geof- 
frey's laborious  step  was  on  the  stair. 

"  Pastner  will  stay  to  tea,"  he  said. 

"Oh!  Is  it  necessary?"  asked  Pris- 
cilla. 

"Yes.  It  is  necessary,"  said  Geof- 
frey, with  his  back  against  the  door. 
"He  is  of  use  to  me.  I  should  think 
even  you  could  appreciate  the  pains  he 
has  taken  to  get  those  things  for  me 
to-day.  He  is  going  to  stay  late  into 
the  night  with  me.  He  has  gone  out 
to  put  up  his  horse  now." 

"Oh,  well,  then,  I  will  leave  tea 
27 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


ready,  and  Martha  can  serve  it.  I  am 
going  to  bed,  for  I  am  tired." 

"You  are  going  to  do  nothing  of 
the  sort,"  cried  Geoffrey.  4 'You  are 
going  to  be  at  the  table  and  make  it 
bright  and  cheerful.  I  am  in  a  glori- 
ous frame  for  getting  through  my  diffi- 
culties. If  my  nerves  are  not  all  upset 
by  your  tempers,  your  vagaries,  I  shall 
come  out  on  open  ground  with  this 
thing,  and  lay  my  hand  on  fame  and 
fortune,  hunchback  or  no  hunchback." 

"Geoffrey  dear,  why  do  you  dwell 
on  what  no  one  notices  after  once 
knowing  you?  And  do  you  really 
think  I  have  such  tempers?"  she  asked, 
with  a  break  in  the  soft  voice. 

"I  think  you  are  the  dearest,  the 
best,  the  most  beautiful  of  women  and 
sisters.  I  think  you  have  my  life  and 
hopes  and  salvation  in  your  hand. 
28 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


You  can  help  me  into  heaven  or  thrust 
me  down  to  hell.  I  think  you  are 
going  to  help  me  into  heaven." 

Priscilla  laughed.  But,  in  spite  of 
herself,  her  mood  was  shattering  and 
melting  away,  and  trouble  was  again 
surrounding  her,  vaguely  and  swiftly 
as  the  rising  of  the  mountain  mists. 
"I  suppose  that  means  that  you  want 
peach  marmalade  and  hot  biscuits  for 
tea,"  she  said. 

"And  some  chili-cum-carne  first. 
And  a  pretty  toilette,  and  a  bright 
face,  and  smiles,  and  a  song,  and  gen- 
eral indulgence,  and  all  your  sweet- 
ness." And  then  he  came  over  and 
lifted  the  long  fallen  tress,  and  laid  his 
fevered  cheek  on  her  cool  face,  putting 
his  long,  weak  arms  around  her.  The 
thought  came  to  her  of  Jerome  kneel- 
ing and  clasping  her  so  in  the  morning, 
29 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

but,  ah,  with  how  different  a  clasp,  in 
all  his  mobility  and  beauty!  And 
now  Geoffrey,  just  on  a  level  with  her 
shoulder  as  he  stood — the  pity  of  it, 
the  horror  of  it!  The  tears  gushed 
forth  as  he  caressed  her.  "You 
needn't  pity  me,"  he  said,  winding 
the  pale  tress  about  her  head.  "If  my 
invention  goes,  I  want  no  one's  pity. 
And  as  for  your  affection,  hasn't  it 
been  mine  from  our  cradle?  Aren't 
we  the  same  soul?  Do  you  suppose  I 
think  for  an  instant  that  you  are  going 
to  be  false  to  me?  When  this  momen- 
tary fancy  of  yours  passes,  you  will 
see  for  yourself  how  idle  it  was. 
You  will  be  more  glad  than  I  of  your 
escape." 

' '  False  to  you  ?' '  stammered  Priscilla. 
But  Geoffrey  laughed.    How  long 
since  she  had  heard  him  laugh  as  light- 
30 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


ly!  And  saying,  "The  blue  chiffons 
now,  and  smiles,  and  hot  biscuits  and 
marmalade,  of  course!"  he  had  gone 
back  to  his  task. 

For  a  pause  Priscilla  hesitated.  She 
would  go  to  her  room  and  to  bed,  and 
let  things  take  care  of  themselves.  And 
then  again  the  pity  of  it  tore  her  ten- 
der heart.  And,  moreover,  notwith- 
standing his  ill  health,  his  fretfulness 
and  deformity,  this  brother  of  hers 
had  a  dominating  strength  of  nature; 
she  had  a  sort  of  reverence  for  his 
intellect,  too.  To  have  his  contempt 
was  something  she  could  not  have  en- 
dured; to  give  him  pleasure  was  the 
habit  of  her  life.  Until  of  late  they 
had  been  of  one  mind,  one  emotion  in 
all  things. 

She  went  to  her  room  after  she  had 
given  old  Martha  the  directions  for  tea, 
3i 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

and  had  laid  the  table  herself,  adding  a 
handful  of  the  precious  crab-cactus 
blossoms  in  a  glass  vase ;  and  she  came 
down  with  a  shine  on  her  hair,  a  glow 
on  her  cheek,  a  smile  on  her  lip,  daz- 
zling withal  in  the  blue  chiffons  that 
Geoffrey  liked ;  and  she  seemed  to  Mr. 
Pastner  the  very  ideal  of  the  bloom  of 
a  June  morning  as  it  had  dawned  on 
him  many  a  time  in  his  dewy  gardens  far 
up  the  hill,  under  clear,  overarching 
heavens,  and  with  the  undulating  land- 
scape far  below.  There  was  a  sort  of 
dreamy  sweetness,  too,  about  Priscilla 
that  night,  the  aura  of  her  earlier  happi- 
ness yet  lingering  around  her,  and  curv- 
ing the  corners  of  her  lips  with  an  in- 
terior sort  of  smile,  the  trouble  of  her 
later  doubt  yet  veiling  some  of  the  lustre 
of  her  eyes.  It  made  both  Geoffrey  and 
Mr,  Pastner  feel  a  great  tenderness  for 
32 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


her.  And  while  it  in  no  wise  changed 
Geoffrey's  determination  regarding  her, 
it  gave  Mr.  Pastner  pause,  till  it  seemed 
to  him  that,  let  what  would  come  to 
himself,  her  happiness  must  be  secured 
before  all  things. 

Nothing  could  be  gayer  or  more  en- 
chanting than  Geoffrey  was  that  night, 
his  high  seat  on  the  cushions  giving 
him  much  the  usual  dignity  of  a  man 
at  his  own  table,  although  it  was  an 
exceptional  man  that  would  not  have 
appeared  something  less  beside  the 
other,  whose  great  stature  and  well- 
knit  frame  might  have  belonged  to  one 
of  the  Anakim.  And  when  Martha 
had  taken  out  the  tea  things,  Priscilla 
sang — some  gentle  German  Lieder, 
some  joyous  old  Jacobite  songs. 

" Those  are  the  things  to  sing,"  said 
Geoffrey  —  "the  people's  songs,  the 
33 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

things  full  of  live  emotions,  the  emo- 
tions common  to  the  race." 

"The  songs  that  are  more  than 
codes  and  laws,"  said  Mr.  Pastner. 

"Yes.  And  sung  in  such  a  voice  as 
that!  A  voice  to  fire  a  multitude! 
What  a  voice  it  would  be  if  it  had  had 
the  training  such  a  voice  ought  to 
have!  You  would  be  a  prima  donna 
assoluta,  sister  mine.  How  would  it 
please  you  to  see  some  great  throng 
hanging  breathless  on  your  tones? 
How  would  the  clapping  hands,  the 
tossing  flowers,  the  raptures  you  gave, 
the  fact  that  you  commanded  their 
tears,  their  joys,  held  their  beings  for 
the  moment  in  your  hand — how  would 
all  that  please  you?" 

"Not  half  so  much,"  said  Priscilla, 
with  a  laugh,  "as  singing  to  you." 

"And  Pastner.  Well,  it  would 
34 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


please  me.  I  would  say  in  my  thoughts 
to  that  throng,  'See,  this  is  I;  part  of 
my  being,  born  at  one  birth,  of  one 
thought,  with  one  life ;  those  tones  are 
mine,  or  all  the  same  as  mine ;  it  is  my 
genius  that  fills  them  and  wrings  your 
tears;  it  is  I,  I  who  am  singing!'  Ah, 
well,  it  is  no  use!  What  did  Provi- 
dence mean,"  he  cried,  with  a  fierce 
and  sudden  change  from  his  genial 
phase,  "by  giving  us  such  things — you 
such  a  voice,  me  such  inventive  power 
— and  then  holding  back  all  the  means 
for  bringing  them  into  use?" 

"They  are  not  held  back,"  said  Mr. 
Pastner,  suddenly ;  and  it  was  perhaps 
bending  over  the  fire  toward  which  he 
was  holding  his  hands  that  made  the 
veins  stand  out  so  on  his  forehead. 
"They  are  yours  if  you  will." 

"Oh,"  said  Priscilla,  lightly,  "Geof- 
35 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


frey's  power  will  prove  itself.  And  as 
for  me,  to  lift  my  voice  with  others,  in 
some  great  church  choir  is  all  the 
dream  I  have." 

1  'And  dream  enough,"  said  Mr. 
Pastner. 

' 1  Well,"  said  Geoffrey,  "if  I  am 
going  to  prove  myself,  I  must 
away  to  the  prover.  I  think  I  see  my 
way  through  that  last  bearing.  Come, 
Pastner." 

Mr.  Pastner  waited  a  moment  till  he 
was  gone,  and  then  went  towards  Pris- 
cilla  just  turning  from  the  piano. 
"The  great  Norse  giant,"  she  was 
saying  to  herself,  conscious  all  the 
same  of  a  kindly  feeling,  as  if  she  could 
not  love  one  man  with  all  the  force  of 
her  love  and  not  have  a  certain  warm 
interest  in  all  other  men.  And  then 
the  calm  depth  of  that  gray  eye  as  she 
36 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

met  its  glance  made  her  uneasy,  the 
smile  of  that  rather  melancholy  mouth, 
according  with  the  nobility  of  the 
white  brow  over  the  suntanned  face, 
gave  her  reassurance,  while  something 
about  its  being  fine  to  have  a  giant's 
strength,  but  tyrannous  to  use  it  like 
a  giant,  was  running  through  her 
mind. 

"I  am  a  useless  piece  of  humanity," 
he  said,  in  a  low  tone,  "  unless  you 
make  me  of  use.  I  want  you  to  un- 
derstand that  I  and  all  I  have  are 
yours,  to  hold,  to  use,  to  throw 
away. 

"Oh,  no,  no!"  cried  Priscilla,  thrust- 
ing out  both  her  hands  before  her. 
But  he  only  bowed  and  closed  the 
door. 


37 


II 


RISCILLA  was  so  worn  out  with 


-L  the  fervors  and  fevers  of  the  day 
that  when  her  head  touched  her  pil- 
low, she  drowsed  away  at  once  into 
a  fitful  slumber.  She  had  a  dull  con- 
sciousness of  voices  and  steps,  par- 
tially waking  her  in  what  seemed  the 
middle  of  the  night,  of  a  wild  rustling 
and  roaring  of  the  wind,  of  a  surprised 
exclamation  about  snow,  of  Geoffrey's 
protesting  voice,  of  the  steps  returning, 
and  of  her  saying  to  herself  wearily 
that  a  sudden  storm  had  come  up  out 
of  that  shadow  in  the  mountain-gap, 
that  Geoffrey  had  not  let  Mr.  Pastner 
go  out  in  it,  but  he  had  put  him  in  the 


39 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


spare  room ;  and  then  she  was  off  again 
and  lost  in  deep  sleep.  She  awoke 
suddenly  with  a  sensation  that  she  had 
overslept  herself,  that  it  was  bright 
day.  Her  next  sensations  came  in 
rapid  successions — that  somewhere  a 
stove  was  smoking,  that  something  was 
scorching,  that  the  whole  outside  world 
was  a  cloud  of  sparks,  that  the  house 
was  on  fire. 

To  thrust  her  feet  into  a  pair  of 
shoes,  to  throw  her  wrapper  and  her 
long  cloak  over  her,  to  seize  an  armful 
of  the  first  clothing  within  reach,  was 
all  done  in  the  three  seconds  as  she 
rushed  for  Geoffrey's  room.  He  was 
not  there;  and  just  as  Mr.  Pastner, 
who,  also,  had  hurried  there,  dashed 
out  of  it,  old  Martha  darted  by  them, 
screaming,  in  a  voice  muffled  by  the 
blanket  on  her  head :  * '  He  's  not  there ! 
4o 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

He 's  out  doors  !  He's  gone!"  And 
Priscilla  ran  with  them  through  a  welter 
of  scorching  smoke  down  the  stairs  and 
across  the  little  hall,  to  find  the  front 
door  still  closed  and  locked.  Mr.  Past- 
ner  threw  it  open  and  pushed  Priscilla 
and  old  Martha  out  into  the  snow. 
"  He  is  not  gone  out ;  he  is  in  the  work- 
shop!" he  cried,  and  sprang  back,  the 
flames,  fanned  by  the  fresh  air,  bursting 
out  about  him.  It  was  only  a  moment 
or  two — it  seemed  a  year  to  Priscilla 
and  old  Martha  huddled  together, 
shivering  in  the  storm,  with  no  help 
near,  and  the  long  tongues  of  flame  al- 
ready shooting  from  the  windows — be- 
fore Mr.  Pastner  came  round,  having 
sprung  from  a  casement  on  the  back  of 
the  house  to  the  roof  of  the  shed  be- 
low, where  he  let  Geoffrey  down  to  the 
ground  and  jumped  after  him — Geof- 
41 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


frey  who  had  at  first  struggled  like  a 
wild-cat,  and  had  then  through  sheer 
impotence  abandoned  himself  to  his 
fate — the  fate  of  being  saved  without 
the  little  demon  of  brass  and  wood 
and  steel  in  which  he  had  imprisoned 
his  very  soul.  "Let  the  house  burn!" 
he  cried  fiercely.  "Let  it  burn!  It 's 
only  of  a  piece  with  all  the  rest  of  the 
way  fate  uses  me !  Let  it  burn  to  the 
ground !  I  wish  I  was  in  it !  What 
did  you  save  me  for?"  But  while  his 
imprecations  were  still  rising  over  the 
roar  of  the  storm  and  the  crackle  of 
the  flames,  Pastner  had  disappeared. 
In  the  same  instant  Priscilla  and  Mar- 
tha rushed  to  the  shed  where  the  horse 
had  been  tied.  They  came  out,  lead- 
ing at  arm's  length  the  startled  and 
plunging  animal,  and  fastened  him  to 
a  tree  at  safe  distance,  just  as  Mr. 
42 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


Pastner  appeared,  staggering  uncer- 
tainly, blackened  and  singed,  in  the 
terrible  radiance,  and  in  his  arms  the 
best  part  of  the  little  monster  whose 
overloaded  wires  had  kindled  all  the 
blaze. 

"Pastner!  Pastner!"  cried  Geoffrey, 
in  a  fury  of  joy.  "You  are  the  mas- 
ter-hand! It  isn't  only  my  life 
you  've  saved.  You  've  saved  my 
soul!  Never  mind  if  it  isn't  all  here 
— a  missing  bolt,  a  missing  plate — that 
is  easily  replaced.  Do  n't  think  I  shall 
forget  this.  At  the  risk  of  your  life! 
There  's  friendship  !  There 's  heroism ! 
Now  let  us  enjoy  the  passing  moment. 
What  are  you  crying  for,  Priscilla? 
The  house  —the  home — pshaw !  See 
the  flames  wallow  up  the  night!  See 
them  swallow  the  black  sky!  See 
them  glorify  the  storm  !  What  a  sky, 
43 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


opening  and  shutting  in  splendor 
with  every  belch  of  flame!  See  these 
elms  —  fountains  of  fire!  There  is 
nothing  so  fine  as  fire !  Every  flake  of 
the  snow  is  a  spark  of  it  to-night. 
What  ?  My  dear  fellow — are  you  hurt  ?' ' 
For  Pastner  had  sunk  against  the  gar- 
den wall,  and  Priscilla  was  heaping  snow 
upon  his  burned  hands.  But  people 
were  already  hurrying  up,  and  were  tak- 
ing him  off  to  the  nearest  house,  and 
Priscilla  turned  to  hasten  Geoffrey  after 
them  and  out  of  the  storm.  With  the 
flushed  and  illuminated  snow  whirling 
and  twisting  about  his  strange  shape 
and  his  wild  gesticulation  like  long 
wreaths  and  spray  of  fire  itself,  the  little 
creature  seemed  more  an  imp  of  fire 
than  a  man.  "Yes,  I  will  come  with 
you, ' '  he  said.  ' '  I  will  come  with  you. 
For  there  can  be  only  one  outcome  to 
44 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


this.  Pastner  has  saved  my  life,  and 
more  than  my  life.  His  reward  lies  in 
your  hands.  You  will  give  it  to  him. 
If  I  did  not  feel  certain  of  it,  I  would 
plunge  into  that  core  of  fire  just  as  I 
surely  should  have  done  had  he  not 
brought  out  my  works — my  more  than 
life!"  There  was  no  time  for  promise 
or  denial,  for  assertion  or  argument. 
Priscilla  only  felt  that  she  must  get 
this  raving  fellow  under  shelter;  and 
she  hurried  him  along  after  the  others 
— for  old  Martha  had  gone  on,  and 
was  already  helping  the  farmer's  wife 
put  a  bed  in  order  and  send  a  boy  as 
fast  as  he  could  gallop  for  the  doctor. 
"Oh,  he  won't  die,"  said  Geoffrey, 
still  in  a  state  of  gleeful  expansion 
when  the  doctor  had  bandaged  the 
burns  and  promised  to  come  around 
later  in  the  morning — for  it  was  now 
45 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

quite  dawn,  and  Priscilla  had  got  on 
some  clothes  and  had  made  Geoffrey 
eat  some  porridge.  "He  won't  die! 
He  will  live  to  have  his  reward.  I  will 
see  to  that  myself."  For  the  physi- 
cian, finding  the  external  injuries  but 
slight,  had  expressed  apprehension 
concerning  the  nervous  shock  and  the 
inhalation  of  the  heated  air,  and  had 
found  great  difficulty  in  reviving  his 
patient  from  the  swoon.  "You  must 
go  to  him,"  Geoffrey  said  to  Priscilla. 
"Your  touch  will  do  more  for  him  than 
a  regiment  of  doctors  can.  Is  n't  that 
so,  doctor?"  And  seated  at  the  table, 
his  face  bright  and  alert,  his  words  had 
superior  meaning  to  those  of  the  little 
atomy  with  ineffectual  strut,  and  the 
doctor  interpreted  them  as  they  were 
meant,  and  of  course  declared  that 
Priscilla's  presence  might  have  the 
46 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


tonic  effect  desired,  and  she  went  into 
the  room  at  once,  as  she  would  have 
gone  to  the  bedside  of  any  sufferer. 
But  as  she  saw  Mr.  Pastner  lying  there, 
so  changed  from  the  strong  young 
giant  of  a  few  hours  before,  the  deathly 
whiteness  of  his  face,  the  labored  faint- 
ing breath,  smote  her  to  the  heart. 
He  had  come  to  this  in  saving  her 
poor  Geoffrey,  in  saving  perhaps 
Geoffrey's  reason,  too  —  at  any  rate, 
his  one  delight  in  life.  And  she  fell 
on  her  knees  and  in  the  impulse  of 
gratitude  and  all  the  moment's  tumul- 
tuous excitation  of  feeling,  kissed  the 
poor  bandaged  hand  where  it  lay  ex- 
tended, exactly  as  she  would  have 
kissed  a  helpless  baby's  hand. 

Perhaps  she  would  have  done  pre- 
cisely the  same  if  she  had  foreseen  the 
smile  that  kindled  the  white  counte- 
47 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


nance.  Mr.  Pastner  lifted  the  wounded 
hand  and  laid  it  on  hers.  Someone 
pushed  a  chair  toward  her;  and  as  she 
sat  there  with  his  fingers  lying  on  hers, 
the  anger  of  the  nerves  died  away,  and 
under  the  soothing  influence  of  her 
touch,  of  her  sorrowful  eyes  with  the 
yearning  pity  of  their  grateful  gaze, 
the  eyelids  closed,  and  pain  and  ten- 
sion yielded  to  the  opiate  at  last. 

"  There!  there!"  said  Geoffrey, 
when  he  saw  Pastner  sleeping. 
"  That  's  all  right.  I  told  you  so.  It 
is  very  alarming,  this  sudden  sinking  in 
the  collapse  after  great  effort.  But 
these  large-framed  men  are  subject  to 
it,  I  believe.  Now  I  am  going  to  have 
a  bath,  and  see  what  I  can  do  in  the 
way  of  decency.  I  believe  old  Martha 
snatched  some  clothes  for  me  as  she  ran. 
How  that  old  tinder-box  burned! 
48 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


Well,  I  have  an  appointment  to  meet." 
Priscilla,  confident  that  old  Martha 
would  attend  to  him  as  usual,  did  not 
particularly  heed  him ;  she  was  think- 
ing how  she  would  let  Jerome  hear  of 
her  whereabouts ;  and  she  knew  noth- 
ing about  it  when  her  brother  sallied 
from  the  farmhouse  and  made  his  way 
to  the  village  inn,  where,  in  answer  to 
his  inquiry,  he  was  told  that  Mr.  Salter 
had  arrived  an  hour  before,  on  the 
noon  coach  from  the  junction.  It  was 
the  elder  Mr.  Salter — Jerome's  all- 
powerful  uncle. 

"I  have  no  apology  to  make  for 
summoning  you  yesterday,  although 
I  hardly  hoped  for  so  speedy  an  an- 
swer to  my  telegram,"  said  Geoffrey, 
after  Mr.  Salter's  rather  stiff  saluta- 
tion, a  salutation  which  hardly  re- 
pressed his  surprise  at  the  appear- 
49 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

ance  of  the  shapeless  little  creature 
with  the  beautiful  face,  wearing  another 
man's  hat  and  coat. 

But  because  he  was  crippled  and  de- 
formed, Geoffrey  never  abated  an  iota 
of  his  dignity  as  a  man,  and  Mr.  Salter 
was  at  once  made  to  feel  that  he  was 
dealing  with  serious  concerns.  "  Noth- 
ing but  imperative  duty  would  warrant 
my  sending  for  you  in  this  weather," 
said  Geoffrey.  "I  hope  you  have  suf- 
fered no  inconvenience  from  the  storm. 
Our  sharp  mountain  storms  are  swift, 
and  I  think  this  has  blown  itself  out. 
But  the  fact  is,"  he  continued  as  he 
moved  a  hassock  along  towards  a  chair, 
deposited  it  therein  with  an  effort,  and 
mounted  and  seated  himself  on  equal 
terms,  "that  my  sister  and  your 
nephew  are  on  the  point  of  a  great 
folly.  They  fancy  themselves  in  love. 
50 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


Mr.  Salter  made  a  quick  motion  of 
dissent  and  surprise.  But  if  he  would 
have  spoken,  he  was  prevented  by 
Geoffrey's  imperious  gesture.  1 '  Noth- 
ing could  be  worse  for  my  sister,''  said 
Geoffrey,  "after  the  subsidence  of  the 
temporary  fascination.  For  I  know 
her  and  her  needs.  And  Jerome  — 
charming  fellow  though  he  is — could 
only  make  her  unhappy  in  the  end. 
The  very  quick  end.  Moreover,  I  have 
other  views  for  her,  as  you,  I  am 
sure,  have  for  Jerome." 

"Certainly  I  have!"  exclaimed  Mr. 
Salter,  too  much  in  earnest  to  observe 
the  absurd  face  of  things  presented  by 
this  strange  little  being's  assumption  as 
the  arbiter  of  destiny. 

' 1  Quite  right, ' '  said  Geoffrey.  ' 1  My 
sister  is  of  no  particular  family,  is  with- 
out a  penny  to  her  name,  and  her  home 
5i 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


was  last  night  burned  to  the  ground, 
with  nearly  all  it  contained — " 

* '  Indeed!    Very  unfortunate." 

"Perhaps  so.  Perhaps  not.  How- 
ever, that  is  neither  here  nor  there.  I 
sent  for  you  to  use  your  influence  with 
Jerome — " 

"Most  assuredly!" 

"Only  let  me  advise  you  that  it  will 
need  extreme  measures.  He  told  my 
sister  yesterday  that  you  had  planned 
a  trip  abroad  with  him  in  the  vacation. 
I  imagine  that  it  may  have  been 
through  startling  her  with  that  that  he 
obtained  her  admission.  She  has 
taught  him  counterpoint — she  is  a  mu- 
sic teacher — and  he  has  taught  her 
singing — and  something  else.  They 
have  seen  much  more  of  each  other 
than  I — engaged  in  my  own  pursuits — 
have  liked.  Perhaps  it  would  be  best 
52 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


to  make  the  trip  immediately;  he  is 
doing  nothing  at  college,  nothing  at  all, 
and  will  take  no  honors,  even  if  he 
secures  a  degree.  That  is  a  pity,  with 
his  natural  parts.  And  then  he  is 
young. 

"May  I  ask,"  said  Mr.  Salter,  who 
had  now  begun  to  be  amused  at  this 
arrogant  miniature  of  a  man,  who  was 
declining  alliance  with  his  nephew, 
"how  old  you  are?" 

"As  old  as  suffering  can  make  a 
man.  'I  am  six  thousand  years  old,' 
said  Marat,  you  may  remember.  T 
am  as  old  as  human  suffering!'  But 
that  is  nothing  to  the  point,  either. 
I  presume  Jerome  will  be  galloping  over 
from  the  college  to-day.  The  man 
who  puts  his  boy  in  a  fresh-water  col- 
lege, supposing  he  is  safe  there — " 

"Or  in  a  salt-water  college  either," 
53 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


said  Mr.  Salter,  making  it  unnecessary 
to  finish  the  sentence. 

"Yes,  the  only  way  to  prevent  youth 
from  having  its  fling  is  to  shut  it  up  in 
a  crippled  body  and  give  it  a  great 
idea.  Yes,  ill  news  travels  post;  and 
Jerome  will  be  over,  expecting  to  find 
us  here  at  the  inn.  He  will  find  you. 
I  trust  it  will  be  enough." 

"I  think  you  may,"  said  Mr.  Salter 
grimly.  And  Jerome  Salter  learned 
that  it  was  enough  and  more  when, 
an  hour  afterward,  he  came  down 
the  snowy  road  just  broken  out  round 
the  mountain,  and  with  a  piece  of 
hemlock  sticking  in  his  hat,  a  happy, 
handsome,  careless  fellow,  whose  joy- 
ous contentment  changed  to  dismay  at 
the  sight  of  his  uncle's  mocking  coun- 
tenance. There  was  a  stormy  hour 
on  his  part,  an  hour  of  raillery,  of  play- 
54 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


ing  with  prey,  on  the  uncle's  part;  and 
then  he  rode  back  with  his  uncle  to  his 
rooms,  no  longer  a  radiant  young  hero, 
but  a  whipped  boy. 

"  You  must  tell  her,  Geoffrey, ' '  wrote 
Jerome  that  night.  "I  can't.  I  have 
no  choice  left,  unless  I  would  be  thrown 
out  like  a  plucked  fowl  on  the  snow- 
drift. I  leave  with  my  uncle  for 
France  to-night.  When  I  come  back  I 
know  not.  He  says  never.  For 
France?    For  perdition !" 

Geoffrey  told  Priscilla  by  placing 
Jerome's  letter  before  her.  4 'You  are 
light  in  the  balance,  you  see,"  said 
Geoffrey.  "His  uncle  offers  him  idle- 
ness, wealth,  and  pleasure.  You  offer 
him  work  and  love  and  home.  It  was 
easy  to  see  how  it  would  be.  And  yet 
one  would  not  have  expected  treachery 
from  Jerome." 

55 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

Priscilla  sat  alone,  after  Geoffrey 
went  out,  in  the  little  room  that  had 
been  lent  her  in  the  farmhouse. 
Jerome's  letter  was  open  on  her  knee; 
but  she  was  not  looking  at  it ;  her  gaze 
was  fixed  straight  ahead  on  the  dead 
white  wall.  She  sat  there  conscious 
of  nothing — simply  stunned. 

If  such  a  letter  had  come  to  her  the 
day  but  one  before,  it  would  have 
given  her  no  such  blow,  for  at  that  time 
she  had  not  allowed  herself  to  recognize 
her  feeling;  she  had  not  allowed  her- 
self to  hope.  But  yesterday  the  sun 
had  burst  forth,  quickening,  vitalizing, 
nourishing  her  love;  it  had  had  clear 
way;  it  had  grown  like  a  gourd  in  the 
night.  If  a  cloud  of  misty  perplexity 
had  followed,  still  there  was  the  love 
in  its  perfect  flower.  And  now,  full 
and  throbbing  with  her  very  life,  what 
56 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


blackening  breath  and  blast  from  the 
bottomless  pit  was  this  that  blew  over 
it  and  smote  and  withered  it?  She 
asked  no  such  question.  She  was  not 
aware  of  a  single  thought  or  emotion. 
She  sat  dumb  and  dead,  staring  at  the 
wall,  seeing  nothing. 

The  women  of  the  house  came  to  the 
door  and  knocked,  and  asked  if  she 
wanted  anything,  and  went  away, 
thinking  her  exhausted  from  the  night's 
consternation  and  fatigue,  and  gone  to 
sleep.  She  never  heard  them.  The 
world  might  have  crashed  to  its  end, 
with  the  heavens  rolling  together  like 
a  scroll,  she  would  not  have  known  it. 

There  was  a  soft  glow  in  the  air 
when  she  became  conscious  that  she 
was  alive,  with  a  piece  of  paper  on  her 
knee  that  was  like  a  death-warrant — 
alive  and  utterly  wretched.  It  was 
57 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


another  day,  but  the  sun  had  not  yet 
risen;  the  daylight  bubbled  in  the 
great  cup  of  the  hills,  and  the  whole 
air  was  full  of  foaming  gold;  a  faint 
rose-bloom  covered  the  long  stretch  of 
the  interval,  deepening  far  off  into  rosy 
amethyst,  and  all  at  once  every  crag 
and  scar  and  face  of  rock  burst  into  a 
blaze  of  whiteness  burning  to  golden 
glory,  and  into  clear  azure  sailed  the 
sun.  What  had  all  this  splendor  to  do 
with  her?  Oh,  nothing!  And  what  was 
her  pain  in  the  midst  of  it?  Oh,  again 
nothing.  How  serene,  how  indiffer- 
ent, how  unloving  was  nature!  Oh, 
no;  how  calm,  how  strong,  how  al- 
ways the  same,  always  there  to  be 
found,  the  same  now  and  forever, 
with  its  calm  and  its  strength,  giving 
rest! 

Priscilla  broke  the  ice  in  her  pitcher 

58 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

for  a  long  draught  of  water;  then  she 
went  to  bed  for  a  couple  of  hours,  and 
she  crept  down  stairs  at  last,  very 
faint  and  white,  to  be  put  in  a  warm 
corner  by  the  farmer's  wife  and  fed 
from  her  one  china  bowl  with  the  dain- 
tiest food  she  had.  She  watched  her 
chance,  when  the  good  woman's  back 
was  turned,  to  put  Jerome's  letter  into 
the  fire.  And  presently  she  found  her 
cloak,  and  tied  a  little  shawl  over  her 
head,  and  went  out  mechanically  to 
give  one  of  the  lessons  that  had  been 
interrupted  yesterday. 

Geoffrey  greeted  her  when  she  came 
in  towards  noon,  with  an  angry  reproof 
for  exposing  herself  as  she  had  done, 
with  insufficient  dress.  "You  seem  to 
think,"  he  said,  "that  there  is  no  one 
but  yourself  in  the  world.  Does  it  never 
occur  to  you  what  will  become  of  me, 
59 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


helpless  and  crippled,  if  you  should 
get  your  death  by  this  sort  of  reckless- 
ness?" 

"Oh,"  said  Priscilla,  something  bit- 
terly, something  wearily,  as  if  she  cared 
nothing,  "you  will  always  have  the 
model." 

"My  model!  Do  you  know  what 
that  reckless  fellow  did  in  bringing  it 
out?  He  turned  it  upside  down,  broke 
the  delicate  gearing,  lost  the  diamond 
pivots,  all  but  ruined  it — ruined  it!" 

"Oh,  Geoffrey,  when  the  poor  soul 
tried  to  save  it  for  you." 

"The  poor  soul!  Pastner!"  with  a 
sharp  laugh.  "You  had  better  say  he 
tried  to  destroy  it !  There  is  nothing 
but  the  idea  left — almost  nothing! 
And  how  am  I  to  revive  that  out  of 
chaos,  with  house  and  home  gone,  with 
no  money,  no  friends,  no  peace,  no 
60 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


quiet?  For  if  we  ever  get  rooms  any- 
where, that  infernal  piano  of  your 
scholars,  with  its  incessant  kringle- 
krangle,  will  grind  into  my  brain  like  a 
knife-sharpener!  I  shall  go  mad;  that 
is  what  I  shall  do. 

Priscilla  saw  that  he  was  wrought 
to  a  pitch  of  exasperation  that  was 
nearly  irresponsible.  In  the  midst  of 
her  misery  she  felt  that  if  all  her  cheer 
was  taken  from  her,  her  care  yet  re- 
mained. "You  shall  have  all  the  quiet 
you  want,  dear,"  she  said.  "I  will 
give  the  lessons  somewhere  else.  I 
suppose  the  insurance  will  rebuild  the 
house — " 

"Nothing  of  the  sort,"  said  Geof- 
frey.   "That  gave  out  last  year." 

"Geoffrey!" 

"Yes.  I  had  to  take  the  premium 
money  for  my  brass-work.    What  else 

61 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


was  I  to  do?  I  ask  you,  what  else  was 
I  to  do,  Priscilla?" 

"I  thought,"  said  she,  "that  Mr. 
Pastner  gave  you  the  brass-work." 

"Do  you  think  I  would  accept  that 
from  him,  when  the  only  thing  I  could 
give  him  in  return  was  denied  him?" 
letting  himself  down  to  the  floor,  and 
walking  to  and  fro  in  a  frantic  haste 
that  had  nothing  ludicrous  in  it  for 
Priscilla,  only  something  heart-break- 
ing. "I  said  to  myself:  'I  shall  finish 
the  model  now.  When  it  is  done,  it 
brings  in  far  more  than  house  and  in- 
surance, than  thousands,  than  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  insurance!'  It  is  my 
fortune  and  yours  together!"  he  cried, 
wringing  his  hands.  "It  is  my  hope, 
my  fame,  my  glory!" 

"I  am  afraid  it  will  never  be  done," 
said  Priscilla,  gathering  up  her  things. 
62 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

"It  rests  with  you,"  he  cried. 
"Whether  it  is  ever  done  or  not  rests 
with  you !" 

She  turned  and  looked  at  him,  be- 
wildered. "With  you,"  he  said. 
"You  have  the  power.  You  can  make 
me,  or  you  can  break  me.  I  am  clay 
in  your  hands."  He  flung  himself 
down  before  the  fire,  his  voice  rising 
almost  to  a  scream,  and  hid  his  face  in 
his  arms,  a  forlorn,  half-crazed  little 
wretch,  groveling  like  a  worm  on  the 
good  housewife's  strip  of  carpet  there. 

"I  don't  know  what  you  mean," 
said  Priscilla.  "Hush,  Geoffrey;  you 
are  acting  like  a  child ;  you  will  wake 
Mr.  Pastner;  they  told  me  he  was 
asleep  when  I  came  in." 

"What  is  it  to  you  whether  he  sleeps 
or  not?"  he  answered,  his  voice  half 
stifled  in  the  rug. 

63 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"I  don't  understand  you." 

"You  understand  me  well  enough. 
You  know  if  you  will  marry  Pastner 
that  all  he  has  is  as  good  as  mine; 
that  then  I  can  finish  my  work;  that  I 
cannot  take  the  money  from  him  un- 
less he  is  my  brother;  that  I  will  not. 
He  will  die,  they  say,  and  it  would 
have  been  such  a  mere  form,  and  for 
such  a  little  while,  and  now,  now — oh, 
selfish,  selfish,  unnatural  and  selfish!" 

"Geoffrey!  My  poor  boy!  my  dar- 
ling!" she  exclaimed,  kneeling  beside 
him.    "You  are  not  yourself." 

"How  can  I  be  myself,"  he  sobbed, 
"with  my  life  wrecked — the  miserable 
little  fraction  of  life  that  I  had — " 

It  was  true.  She  thought,  as  she 
looked  at  him,  how  terribly  true.  It 
was  a  miserable  little  fraction  of  life 
that  he  had.  She  had  always  been 
64 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


troubled  with  the  sense  that  she  herself 
had  absorbed  all  the  strength  and  elas- 
ticity, and  had  left  him  only  the  worth- 
less remnant.  She  had  tried  to  make 
it  up  to  him  by  unceasing  care  and 
love  and  fostering.  He  had  been  the 
one  object  of  her  days,  till  that  bale- 
star  of  Jerome's  beauty  and  charm  rose 
over  her,  till  this  strange  glamour  of 
passion  had  overshone  her.  That  pas- 
sion was  dead.  Oh,  not  only  dead, 
but  could  it  ever  have  existed?  Je- 
rome, false  to  her,  treacherous  to  love, 
annihilated  himself.  That  love  was 
dead.  This  love,  at  any  rate,  remained, 
must  always  remain,  could  never  die. 
As  she  rose  and  walked  up  and  down 
the  room  her  sore  heart  ached  anew  for 
the  poor  little  creature  lying  there,  a 
mockery  of  humanity,  sensitive  with 
the  sensitive  nerves  of  genius,  sensitive 
65 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


with  the  nerves  of  a  frame  whose 
every  nerve  was  bristling,  was  a  sharp 
agony.  She  felt  it  would  be  little  to 
die  for  him;  she  felt,  in  the  great 
yearning  that  went  out  to  him,  that  it 
was  little  even  to  live  for  him.  She 
had  given  her  own  way  for  his  all  her 
life.    Why  cease  now? 

She  went  and  stooped  over  him. 
"I  will  marry  Mr.  Pastner, "  she  said, 
gently,  and  then  went  out  of  the  room. 

For  a  moment  or  two  the  strange, 
wayward  being  lay  there,  letting  his  pas- 
sion storm  itself  out ;  then  sobs  and  tears 
and  whispers  ceased,  as  they  cease  with 
a  tired  child;  he  rolled  over  towards 
the  fire,  and  snapped  his  fingers  at  the 
dropping  coals,  and  stayed  awhile  tak- 
ing his  rest. 

It  was  not  many  minutes,  however, 
before  the  little  man  was  all  alert  again, 

66 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


refreshed  and  ready  for  the  fray,  and 
he  dusted  himself,  and  went  up  to  his 
friend's  room. 

Mr.  Pastner  was  resting  quietly,  un- 
der a  mild  opiate. 

"This  is  no  place  for  you,  Pastner," 
Geoffrey  said,  rousing  him.  "It  is  no 
place  for  Priscilla.  If  she  is  to  nurse 
you  back  to  strength,  you  should  be 
removed  at  once  to  your  own  house. 
That  is  what  the  doctor  thinks  best. 
And  if  you  are  going  to  be  removed  at 
all,  it  may  as  well  be  now  as  any  day, 
my  dear  boy. 

A  flush  mounted  the  pale  forehead ; 
for  the  instant  the  lethargy  was  all 
gone;  a  glance  of  inquiry  shot  from  the 
eager  eye. 

"Well,"  said  Geoffrey,  "I  suppose 
you  know  best  about  it.  Perhaps  I  am 
too  abrupt.  I  can  only  speak  for  Pris- 
67 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

cilia.  When  she  saw  you  yesterday- 
morning  and  kissed  that  hand  of  yours 
she  confessed  it  all." 

' ' You  think  so?"  murmured  Pastner. 

"I  know  so." 

"It  — it  seems  impossible." 

"That  is  because  you  have  been 
blind  these  last  weeks.  Do  you  think 
a  girl's  No  is  always  No?  There  are 
other  telltales  than  the  tongue.  At 
any  rate,  Priscilla —  Well,  I  have 
gathered  her  wishes,  and  they  are 
yours.  As  for  what  remains,  we  can 
send  up  the  hill  for  the  long  sleigh, 
with  the  seats  out,  and  a  single  mat- 
tress in  it,  and  you  can  be  laid  in 
that,  just  as  you  are,  wrapped  in  all 
the  blankets  necessary,  and  covered 
with  the  furs.  The  chestnuts  will  carry 
you  up  the  hill  in  twenty  minutes,  and 
Priscilla  will  follow  along  in  the  cutter; 

68 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


and  that  can  come  back  for  me.  I  will 
see  to  it  at  once  if  you  say  so." 

"If  I  say  so!"  whispered  the  other. 

"And  have  the  minister  here." 

Mr.  Pastner  opened  his  eyes  wide, 
as  if  a  great  awe  obliged  him,  a  doubt, 
a  terror,  a  joy,  an  assurance.  "Yes," 
he  breathed  —  "yes."  And  in  the 
pause  before  the  other  left  the  room 
he  seemed  to  be  asleep  again.  But 
it  was  not  sleep.  It  was  more  like  a 
trance  of  still  delight,  and  then  a  meas- 
uring of  himself  and  his  desert  and  his 
power  to  give  happiness,  a  resolve  to 
be  worthy  of  so  benign  a  fate  as  this 
that  had  befallen  him. 

Geoffrey  brought  Priscilla  into  the 
room  presently,  and  seated  her  by  the 
bed,  so  that  when  their  friend  opened 
his  eyes  they  should  rest  first  on  her. 
He  had  told  her  that  Mr.  Pastner 
69 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


wished  to  be  married  and  removed  to 
the  hill  at  once,  which  was  his  arrange- 
ment of  the  truth.  And  Priscilla,  feel- 
ing that  if  it  was  to  be,  it  might  as 
well  be  now  as  any  time,  had  made  no 
objection.  She  was  doing  it  for  Geof- 
frey— her  poor  Geoffrey ;  let  it  be  done 
with  a  good  grace.  And  if  the  man 
were  dying,  why  not  give  him  this  one 
happiness  for  the  end?  She  was  in  a 
mist,  in  a  dream ;  her  moral  sense  was 
benumbed  by  the  blow  she  had  re- 
ceived. Moving  slowly,  looking 
vaguely,  whether  it  were  right  or 
wrong  she  never  asked.  It  was  to  be 
done.  It  was  all  she  could  do  for 
Geoffrey. 

But  when  Mr.   Pastner  at  length 
opened  his  eyes  again  and  met  hers, 
such  a  shining  of  sudden  joy  filled 
them  that  through  all  her  semi-stupor 
70 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


it  touched  her  with  a  new  sensation, 
as  if  Ithuriel's  lance  of  light  had  pene- 
trated the  darkness,  and  given  her  a 
glimpse  of  the  injury  she  might  be 
doing  him.  A  momentary  glimpse 
only;  it  was  gone  with  the  sound  of 
Geoffrey's  voice  in  the  next  room  ;  but 
it  had  sent  a  soft  sweeping  blush  over 
her  face,  a  blush  that  made  her  look 
infinitely  lovely. 

"Are  you  sure?"  he  murmured.  "Is 
it  so?  Are  you — after  all — are  you 
going  to  be  my  wife?" 

She  bent  her  head. 

"Do  you  love  me,  then,  Priscilla?" 
he  said.  "-Stoop  down  and  kiss  me  if 
you  love  me,  dear.  Or  am  I  only 
dreaming?  If  you  are  a  dream,  stoop 
down  and  kiss  me  all  the  same." 

She  hesitated  half  a  moment.  Love 
him.  There  was  no  such  thing  as  love. 
7i 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

She  had  just  proved  it.  But  stoop 
down  and  kiss  him?  Yes,  she  could 
do  that  for  any  sick  and  suffering  soul. 
But  she  did  not  say  to  her  own  per- 
ception that  she  was  a  dream,  or  that 
she  was  in  a  dream,  dazed,  and  but 
half  aware  of  herself,  aware  only  of 
the  thing  that  was  straight  before  her. 
She  stooped  down  and  kissed  him, 
rosy  still,  but  not  with  any  sense  of 
shame.  And  then  Geoffrey  and  the 
minister  had  come,  and  she  went 
through  her  part  in  the  same  unruffled, 
half-conscious  way,  and  then  helped 
wrap  her  husband  in  the  blankets  and 
the  robes,  and  the  men  took  him 
down  to  the  big  sleigh,  and  laid  him 
in,  and  covered  him,  and  dashed  away; 
and  she  put  on  her  cloak  and  the  little 
shawl  of  the  farmer's  wife,  and  fol- 
lowed in  the  cutter,  as  it  had  been  ar- 
72 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


ranged,  and  was  up  at  the  great  house 
on  the  high  hill-side  just  as  Mr.  Past- 
ner  had  been  made  comfortable  in  his 
own  room. 

She  looked  round  the  spacious  room 
where  the  sun  poured  in  over  oriental 
rug  and  costly  carving,  and  the  wide 
windows  framed  their  splendid  moun- 
tain picture  of  snowy  hill  and  violet 
distance,  with  no  sense  that  it  was  hers, 
that  now  she  was  mistress  of  noble 
mansion  or  princely  fortune,  with  no 
other  sense  than  that  she  was  here,  and 
that  the  next  thing  to  do  was  to  sit 
down  by  the  bedside.  Something  had 
delayed  Geoffrey  a  few  moments.  She 
was  listening  for  him,  unaware  that 
that  was  the  only  thought  in  her  mind. 
She  sat  looking  straight  before  her  till 
she  heard  him.  Then  she  rose  and 
laid  aside  her  cloak. 

73 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


Mr.  Pastner's  eyes  followed  her. 
" My  wife,"  he  said.  She  came  to  him. 
"I  am  not  going  to  die,"  he  whis- 
pered. "I  might  have  died.  You 
have  saved  me.  Now  I  shall  be 
well."  And  then,  in  the  stroke  of 
a  flash  of  lightning,  Priscilla  felt 
not  the  injury  she  had  done  this 
man,  but  that  she  had  made  herself 
a  prisoner,  and  that  Jerome  Salter 
was  abroad  in  the  world.  And  she 
fell  down  and  hid  her  face  in  the 
coverlet. 

What  was  Jerome  Salter  to  her? 
Nothing.  Nothing  indeed — but  still 
— oh,  the  place  was  sore,  so  sore!  Her 
husband  lifted  his  well  hand  and  laid 
it  on  her  head  as  she  knelt.  It  sent  a 
shudder  through  her;  she  trembled 
from  head  to  foot.  Oh,  how  unworthy 
of  that  kind  touch!  Heaven  help  her! 
74 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


Her  heart  was  broken — her  heart  was 
broken ! 

He  thought  she  was  praying.  And 
so,  in  the  real  truth  of  things,  she  was 
— a  prayer  that  had  its  own  answer. 
What  did  those  women  do  whose  joy 
on  earth  had  ceased — those  sister- 
hoods of  holy  women?  They  cared  for 
the  sick  and  dying.  Here  was  one  sick 
and  but  lately  dying  at  her  hand.  When, 
at  sound  of  Geoffrey 's  step  she  arose,  the 
smile  on  Mr.  Pastner's  face  was  radiant. 

"I  want  you — to  go  over  the — 
house — and  look  at  your  domain,"  he 
said,  laboriously,  the  courtesy  of  his 
nature  triumphing  over  his  weakness 
and  his  disconnected  thought.  "Or 
will  you  wait — till  I  can  take  you?" 

"I  shall  have  to  wait,"  she  an- 
swered, "for  it  is  time  I  went  to  give 
my  afternoon  lesson." 

75 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


He  looked  at  her  an  instant,  a  little 
puzzled.  " Your  lesson?"  And  then 
he  laughed,  even  in  his  faintness. 
"You  sweet,  simple  heart!"  he  said. 
"Don't  you  know — there  are  no  more 
music  lessons?" 

"There — there  must  be,"  said  Pris- 
cilla. 

"My  dear  fellow,"  said  Geoffrey, 
coming  in,  "how  you  have  revived! 
You  needed  the  counter-shock.  Ah, 
happiness  is  a  great  tonic." 

"Look  here,"  murmured  Mr.  Past- 
ner,  grimly.  "Priscilla  thinks — she 
must — go  on  with  her  lessons." 

Geoffrey  laughed.  "You  can't  give 
lessons  and  take  care  of  your  hus- 
band," he  said. 

"We — must  buy  out  the  lessons," 
said  the  other,  smilingly.  "Will  you 
attend  to  all  that,  Geoffrey?"  And 
76 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


now,  thoroughly  tired  out,  he  was 
asleep  almost  before  Geoffrey  replied. 

It  was  as  Geoffrey  had  said — hap- 
piness is  a  great  tonic.  It  can  lift  the 
force  of  a  shock  to  the  nerves  when  it 
comes  like  a  shock  itself;  and  if  it  can- 
not mend  broken  ribs  or  cure  burns  or 
repair  the  injury  of  interior  surfaces, 
it  can  make  the  conditions  favorable 
for  the  healing  of  all  hurt.  To  see  Pris- 
cilla's  face  of  what  he  deemed  gentle 
concern,  to  see  her  moving  about,  to 
hear  her  sweet  low  tones,  to  be  sensi- 
ble of  her  surpassing  beauty,  to  note 
the  intense  tenderness  and  pity  of  the 
eyes  that  followed  Geoffrey,  to  see  the 
color  mount  the  rich  velvet  of  her 
cheek  sometimes  at  idle  words  of  his 
— he  could  not  conjecture  why — was 
all  an  elixir  of  life.  As  before  this  he 
had  not  cared  to  live,  now  he  was  de- 
77 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


termined  not  to  die.  He  did  not  ob- 
serve that  his  wife  gave  him  no  caresses, 
that  her  morning  and  evening  kiss  was 
a  perfunctory  matter:  there  was  some- 
thing pleasant  to  him  in  this  chaste 
shyness;  he  did  not  know  that  even 
that  kiss  was  given  through  the  irre- 
sistible impulse  of  compassion.  And 
when,  at  his  wish,  Geoffrey  supplied 
her  with  costly  garments  and .  laid 
some  jewels  in  her  hands,  he  did  not 
love  her  less  that  she  left  the  jewels 
where  she  dropped  them.  Even  a 
suspicion  of  her  apathy  did  not  pene- 
trate through  his  own  weakness,  and 
he  did  not  know  it  was  only  because 
she  found  it  then  all  but  impossible 
to  sing,  that  she  covered  over  many  a 
long  lapse  into  silence  by  the  gentle 
playing  of  dreamy  nocturnes.  Nor 
did  any  sense  of  the  wealth  now  hers, 
78 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


or  of  the  luxury  and  charm  of  the  house 
appear  to  have  the  least  effect  upon 
her  consciousness ;  her  eye  was  insen- 
sible to  the  soft  tones  of  the  draperies 
and  of  the  deep  pile  in  which  she  set 
her  feet ;  her  frame  did  not  feel  the 
cushioned  ease  of  low  silken  arm- 
chairs and  divans;  she  had  ceased  to 
be  sensitive  to  beauty  in  picture  or 
sculpture,  or  in  the  china  that  was 
priceless  as  precious  stones,  and  the 
ring  of  the  gold  plate,  whose  vibra- 
tion gave  Geoffrey's  nerves  a  pleasant 
thrill  like  music,  was  unheard  by  her. 
She  was  benumbed  through  all  the 
avenues  by  which  pleasure  had  ever 
reached  her. 

The  fact  with  Priscilla  was  that  the 
blow  which  had  killed  her  love  had 
nearly  killed  her,  not  in  her  physical 
but  in  her  mental  and  moral  being. 
79 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


She  felt  no  repulsion  for  Mr.  Pastner, 
no  hostility  towards  him ;  she  was 
neither  glad  nor  sorry  that  he  recov- 
ered. Nothing  about  him  affected 
her  personally.  His  superb  stature, 
the  purity  of  his  large  Northern  type, 
the  fearless  clearness  of  his  great  gray 
eyes,  the  wholesome  sweetness  of  his 
mouth,  the  open  frankness  of  his  coun- 
tenance, the  nobility  and  generosity  of 
his  nature,  all  this  had  mattered  noth- 
ing to  her  when  he  was  well ;  it  could 
not  matter  less  now.  She  experienced 
only  one  simple  series  of  emotions  in 
relation  to  him, — a  deep  and  kindly 
gratitude  that  he  had  saved  Geoffrey's 
life,  and  what  was  more  than  life  to 
Geoffrey,  the  model;  that  of  course 
she  belonged  to  him,  but  as  the  pay- 
ment of  a  debt,  as  the  price  of  Geof- 
frey's happiness;  that  it  all  gave  Geof- 
80 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


frey  contentment — Geoffrey,  to  whom 
so  much  of  happiness  had  been  denied; 
and  that  for  herself  it  was  no  sort  of 
consequence  whatever,  any  more  than 
what  became  of  her  ashes  after  she 
was  dead.  If  she  had  been  a  shadow, 
she  could  hardly  have  felt  less. 

But  now,  as  soon  as  the  burns  on 
Mr.  Pastner's  hand  and  side  began  to 
heal,  they  healed  rapidly;  and  with 
that  the  strength  which  the  nervous 
shock  had  so  suddenly  prostrated  be- 
gan to  come  back  to  him.  He  was 
showing  the  vivid  interest  in  things 
about  him  that  he  used  to  show.  He 
was  inquiring  into  the  condition  of  the 
model,  and  where  its  fragments  had 
been  set  up,  and  into  the  condition  of 
Geoffrey's  mind  regarding  it  as  well. 
He  could  be  assisted  the  length  of  the 
room.  Then  he  could  go  up  and 
81 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


down  stairs.  Then  he  could  have  his 
fur  coat  put  on  and  walk  on  the  piazza. 
The  doctor  declared  it  needed  only  a 
Southern  month  or  two  to  complete 
the  cure.  "Come,"  he  said,  one  day, 
"now  we  will  have  our  wedding 
journey." 

"And  will  Geoffrey  go,  too?"  asked 
Priscilla,  wistfully. 

"Why  —  if  —  if  he  will  —  if  you 
wish,"  stammered  Mr.  Pastner. 

"Not  I,  "laughed  Geoffrey.  "What 
are  you  thinking  of,  Priscilla?  And 
leave  my  model  and  the  unlimited  bank 
account  you  make  mine  for  its  sake — " 

"For  Priscilla' s  sake,"  said  Mr. 
Pastner. 

"For  no  matter  whose  sake!  And 
make  a  holy  show  of  myself  in  the 
great  world?    Not  I.    Two  are  com- 
pany.   Go  and  take  your  pleasure  and 
82 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


come  back  to  me.  The  house,  the 
mountains,  the  model,  and  I  will  all  be 
here. " 

And  Mr.  Pastner — too  full  of  glad- 
ness in  his  recovery,  in  the  return  of 
strength,  in  the  assurance  of  health,  in 
the  companionship  of  his  wife,  a  glad- 
ness all  hope  of  which  he  had  aban- 
doned, to  notice  that  it  was  not  she  who 
was  full  of  anything  of  the  sort,  to 
notice  that  she  was  only  full  of  pa- 
tience— folded  round  his  wife  the  rich 
furs  that  had  been  ordered  for  her, 
and  took  her  on  her  wedding  journey. 

It  was  a  brief  wedding  journey. 

To  Geoffrey,  drawing  and  designing, 
rapt  in  his  ideas,  his  imaginings,  his 
creating,  it  seemed  a  mere  morning 
excursion  that  brought  them  back 
again — Priscilla  very  pale  and  stately, 
Mr.  Pastner  paler  and  more  stately  still. 
83 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

Geoffrey  asked  no  questions;  he 
wished  to  hear  nothing.  Perhaps  it 
did  not  occur  to  him  that  there  was 
anything  to  hear.  At  any  rate,  he 
never  did  know  anything  about  that  bit- 
ter hour  when  the  husband  learned  of 
the  mistake  he  had  made,  but  refused 
to  give  his  wife  the  freedom  she  woke 
from  her  trance  sufficiently  to  ask. 
No,  she  was  his  care  still ;  the  moun- 
tain house  should  still  be  hers;  she 
should  have  Geoffrey  there  as  she  had 
had  him  before;  and  for  what  re- 
mained, although  they  had  made  a  sad 
error,  she  was  his  wife,  and  must  abide 
by  it,  and  live  as  became  his  wife. 
She  was  not  to  be  troubled  by  his 
presence.  And  then  for  a  moment  he 
had  thrown  his  arms  about  her  in  a 
forgetfulness  of  love  and  grief,  and  had 
flung  her  away  as  quickly,  angry  that 
84 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


even  then  she  stood  passive,  with  no 
resistance,  not  only  with  no  sign  of 
fervor,  but  with  no  sign  of  affront. 

Mr.  Pastner  staid  a  week  or  two  at 
the  mountain  house,  attending  to  vari- 
ous requisite  details,  and  acquainting 
Geoffrey  with  bank  affairs  and  other 
matters. 

"My  health,"  he  said  to  Geoffrey, 
"and  some  important  arrangements 
make  it  necessary  that  I  should  be 
absent.   You  will  take  care  of  my  wife  ?" 

"Of  Priscilla?  Of  course,"  said 
Geoffrey.  "But  absent  —  why,  I 
do  n't  see  what  I  am  going  to  do  with- 
out you.  Not  for  long,  I  hope. 
Priscilla  takes  no  interest  whatever 
now  in  what  I  am  doing.  Priscilla  is 
quite  a  different  woman  since  the  fire. 
I  think  it  shocked  her.  She  is  simply 
numb — wrapped  up  in  herself.  I  want 
85 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


you,  I  need  you  here,  every  day, 
George,  to  discuss  these  new  bearings. 
Now  here  is  a  problem — " 

"My  dear  man,"  said  Mr.  Pastner, 
"I  have  been  confronted  with  a  more 
serious  problem,  and  am  unable  to  solve 
it.  And  there  is  the  whistle  of  the 
train  round  the  mountain.    Good-by ! ' ' 


86 


Ill 


IT  was  a  languid  and  silent  young 
matron  who  presided  at  the  table 
in  those  long,  lonely  days,  when  Geof- 
frey, nervous,  elate,  and  talkative,  was 
wheeled  in  by  the  man  that  Mr.  Past- 
ner  had  provided  for  him,  and  filled 
the  time  with  dissertations  upon  his 
work. 

"It  is  a  most  singularly  constructed 
universe,"  he  exclaimed,  after  they 
were  alone,  one  noon.  "All  things 
are  so  interconnected.  You  touch  one 
string  and  all  the  others  vibrate.  Here, 
in  finishing  one  invention,  I  find  my- 
self on  the  verge  of  something  as  far 
beyond  that  as  the  universe  of  Orion 
87 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


is  beyond  the  sun  and  moon  and 
seven  stars.  It  tempts  me  to  pro- 
ceed with  it,  to  look  into  it  a  little 
further —  Why  don't  you  say  some- 
thing, Priscilla?  Why  don't  you 
speak?  I  expected  you  would  remon- 
strate, you  would  urge  me  to  stick  to 
my  last — that  is  my  first — " 

' 1  Oh,  no, ' '  said  Priscilla.  ' '  I  would 
rather  you  did  what  you  like  best  to 
do." 

"I  should  think  you  were  be- 
witched!" cried  Geoffrey.  "  Pos- 
sessed! Is  it  possible  that  Jerome 
Salter—" 

' 'Do  not  speak  of  him!"  exclaimed 
Priscilla,  with  her  blue  eyes  sparkling. 
"I  do  not  know  him.  He  is  dead. 
He  never  existed." 

'  'That  is  all  right.  Still,  although 
I  had  an  affection  for  the  fellow  my- 
88 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


self,  he  is  not  quite  worth  such  hero- 
ics." 

"No,"  she  said.    "That  is  true." 

"In  point  of  fact,"  said  Geoffrey, 
cracking  a  nut,  "I  believe  he  is  alive 
and  enjoying  himself  very  well,  after 
the  fashion  of  the  prodigal  son,  in 
Paris,  although  he  has  not  yet  come  to 
the  husks."  But  as  she  said  no  more, 
he  went  on:  "Well,  then,  with  no  re- 
grets for  Salter,  and  married  to  a  man 
of  the  Northern  Sagas,  with  more 
money  than  you  know  how  to  spend, 
and  mistress  of  this  baronial  house, 
what  in  the  world  is  the  matter  with 
you?  You  seem  to  be  more  dead  than 
alive!" 

"I  am,"  she  said. 

But,  whether  or  no,  from  day  to  day 
Priscilla  went  through  the  ordinary 
motions  of  life.    She  accepted  service 
89 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


at  the  hands  of  her  maids ;  she  agreed 
to  what  the  housekeeper  said;  she 
went  out  to  walk  every  morning,  if  the 
horses  did  not  come  round  first;  if  they 
did,  she  went  to  drive.  She  received 
the  calls  of  her  old  music  scholars,  of 
the  college  youths  and  dons  who  had 
been  wont  to  call  upon  her  before,  of 
the  village  gentry  who  had  not  been 
wont  to  call  before.  She  listened,  as 
if  her  life  depended  on  it,  to  all  that 
Geoffrey  said  about  his  new  principle 
of  motion;  and  she  read  every  week 
the  letter  that  arrived  from  her  hus- 
band. 

" Geoffrey,  dear,"  she  said,  humbly, 
one  twilight  when  he  was  playing  out 
one  of  his  miseries,  "play  to  me  some 
happy  things.  You  are  happy  now, 
Geoffrey,  are  you  not?" 

"I !" 

90 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"Do  you  suppose  any  one  is  hap- 
py?" she  asked,  wistfully. 

"For  a  moment,  the  bird  on  the 
bough.  Play  happy  things?  There  is 
no  happy  music.  Under  it  all  is  the 
note  of  sorrow.  The  maddest,  mer- 
riest dance  music  is  the  saddest  of  the 
whole.  That  note  of  sorrow — do  you 
suppose  I,  with  my  findings,  should 
not  find  that?" 

"My  poor  child!  I  had  hoped  I  had 
made  you  happy." 

"You?"  he  said,  with  mild  surprise 
on  his  beautiful  face.  "You  might 
say  Pastner  had.  You  might  say 
Pastner  had  tried.  But  it  was  idle 
effort.  How  shall  I  ever  be  happy? 
If  I  had  an  answer  from  the  genius 
dwelling  inside  the  photosphere  — 
after  the  first  instant  it  would  be 
I,  this  little  manikin."  Priscilla's 
91 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


heart  was  a  lump  of  lead  as  she  heard 
him. 

And  so  it  was  all  for  nothing. 

Dejection  hung  over  her  now,  like  a 
shroud;  the  days  were  so  long,  so  slow; 
there  was  nothing  they  could  bring  her, 
she  said.  She  would  have  been  satisfied 
were  each  day  the  last;  but  she  did 
not  even  wish  to  die.  Only  one  day 
was  marked  more  distinctly  than 
another  because  on  such  a  day  a  letter 
came,  an  unwelcome  letter. 

They  were  such  letters  as  any  friend 
might  write  another.  He  hoped  she 
was  well ;  he  trusted  that  Geoffrey  was 
succeeding;  he  felt  that  Geoffrey's 
ideas  were  inspirations,  if  only  they 
could  be  made  practicable ;  he  sent  her 
some  new  music  that  he  had  heard,  and 
told  of  the  way  it  moved  the  throng  at 
the  concert.  He  was  in  New  York, 
92 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


and  had  seen  a  play — he  described  it 
to  her;  he  was  in  Washington,  and 
had  seen  Congress  at  work — he  made 
her  see  it,  too ;  he  was  in  New  Orleans, 
and  he  took  her  with  him  to  the 
French  market ;  he  was  tarpon-fishing, 
and  he  would  have  her  share  the  ex- 
citement and  danger  with  him.  How 
was  she  to  tell  with  what  heart-beats, 
with  what  heart-sinking,  with  what 
heart-ache  these  calm  and  pleasant 
pages  were  written?  Nothing  in  them 
whispered  to  her  the  sharp  regret  at 
the  ruin  of  her  young  life,  the  lonely 
bitterness  over  the  ruin  of  his  own.  It 
did  not  seem  that  he  who  wrote  them 
could  be  in  the  least  unhappy. 

Opening  them,  at  first  with  hesita- 
tion, even  with  reluctance,  Priscilla  pres- 
ently found  herself  reading  them  a  sec- 
ond time,  found  herself  looking  for  them. 
93 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


At  all  events  they  made  a  break.  One 
day,  she  did  not  know  why,  but  prob- 
ably because  she  was  human  and  kind, 
she  answered  one  of  them — briefly 
enough,  but  telling  him  in  a  page  or 
two  of  the  affairs  of  the  big  farm  as 
they  came  to  her.  His  letters  to  her 
began  simply  enough  with  "My  dear 
Wife"  —  a  form  merely.  It  seemed 
only  natural  and  necessary  that  she 
should  say  "My  dear  Husband,"  as 
he  had  pitched  the  tone;  and  she 
signed  hers  "Priscilla."  At  least  she 
owed  him  that. 

The  winter  had  worn  away  at  last, 
with  Priscilla  sometimes  buried  in  vast 
snow-drifts,  her  German  lexicon,  a  long 
stretch  of  practice,  or  rather  purposeless 
study  of  counterpoint  and  composition 
for  companion,  walking  to-day,  driving 
far  to-morrow,  listening  to  Geoffrey, 
94 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


soothing  his  discontents,  sympathizing 
with  his  enthusiasm,  and  trying  to  un- 
derstand what  it  was  all  about  and  why 
he  cared.  Now  the  wild  March  winds 
had  blown  the  vapors  from  the  hills  in 
long  scarfs  and  webs,  and  off  and 
away  to  distant  skies,  and  the  April 
rains  were  melting  the  snow  in  the 
deeper  valleys  and  filling  the  air  with 
fresh  earthy  scents,  and  there  were 
gauzy  veils  of  pale  blue  bloom  over  all 
the  landscape,  now  and  then  letting 
out  sudden  visions  of  the  hill-tops  like 
glorified  spirits  looking  on  the  earth. 

Priscilla  had  been  walking  in  the  gar- 
den, where  the  borders  had  been  un- 
covered, the  paths  raked,  and  all  made 
ready  for  the  first  warm  weather  that 
should  allow  the  plants  to  be  brought 
from  the  greenhouse.  She  stopped, 
leaning  her  arm  on  the  broad  parapet 
95 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

which  walled  one  edge  of  the  garden 
over  a  considerable  precipice  under 
which  a  rushing  brook  brawled  on  its 
way  to  the  lakes  below.  Far  stretched 
the  tender  blue  sky  with  a  brooding 
mother-love  across  the  earth,  the  earth 
far-stretching  too,  with  hills  and  inter- 
vals all  mirroring  the  soft  azures  of  the 
heaven,  shadowing  under  passing 
clouds  to  violet  that  melted  into  the 
somber  depth  of  great  forests,  into  the 
green  gilding  of  springing  wheat,  the 
dun  gold  of  dry  ploughed  fields — all 
large  and  lovely  and  full  of  life.  As 
she  leaned  there  and  looked  out,  sud- 
denly she  felt  herself  suffused  with  joy, 
as  if  on  the  instant  she  had  recognized 
the  inner  meaning  of  all  nature,  the 
hidden  things  of  creation — had  for  the 
first  time  understood  that  earth  was  so 
beautiful,  fate  was  so  kind,  God  was 
96 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


so  near.  As  her  glance  came  back 
from  the  peacefulness  of  the  great 
view,  it  fell  on  a  little  mother-bird  sit- 
ting serenely  in  her  lately-built  nest 
and  regarding  her  fearlessly  with  her 
soft  black  eye.  Tears  rushed  to  Pris- 
cilla's  eyes,  tears  of  a  quick  delight; 
she  moved  gently  away,  followed  by 
that  fearless  glance.  "I  will  not  hurt 
you,  little  bird,"  she  said;  "we  are 
just  two  mothers  together!" 

But  the  letter  which  she  had  in  her 
hand  was  the  last  that  she  mailed  to 
her  husband  that  year.  She  could  not 
speak  of  her  great  sweet  secret — that 
was  impossible — and  it  filled  all  her 
thoughts.  He  wrote  that  he  missed 
her  letters,  short  as  they  were;  but 
they  had  been  given  out  of  her  good- 
ness, and  feeling  that  he  had  no  claim, 
he  must  abide  her  will  in  the  matter. 
97 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


He  never  said  how  hard  it  was  for  him 
to  live  without  her,  without  other  word 
of  her  than  the  bare  mention  that  came 
from  Geoffrey,  absorbed  in  his  levers 
and  balances,  how  hard  to  write  on 
with  his  own  weekly  letter  and  have 
no  sign  in  response. 

But  he  did  write  on.  He  had  estab- 
lished himself  for  the  time  in  a  hunting 
region  not  too  remote  from  telegraphs 
and  post-offices;  he  told  her  of  the 
hunt,  of  the  sounds  and  sights  of 
nature,  but  he  never  reproached  her 
with  being  the  cause  of  his  isolation 
from  the  world  of  men.  And  without 
her  knowledge  of  the  process,  the 
strength  and  largeness,  the  purity  and 
wholesomeness  of  his  nature  must  have 
affected  her  as  she  read. 

The  summer  followed  the  spring. 
The  house,  the  gardens,  were  full  of 
98 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


Priscilla's  singing,  the  clear  voice  carol- 
ing to  heaven,  for  she  was  out-doors 
most  of  the  time.  She  seemed  to  in- 
vite the  sunshine  into  her  being;  she 
ran  down  drenched  with  showers;  she 
walked  beside  Geoffrey's  pony  up  the 
rocky  ways  to  the  eagles'  nests,  and 
looked  at  the  young  eaglets ;  and  she 
made  Geoffrey  for  a  while  find  pleas- 
ure in  the  strength  of  the  hills. 

Then  the  grapes  were  ripe  on  every 
sunny  ledge;  the  days  were  short  as 
they  were  splendid ;  storms  washed 
the  heavens  of  stain;  and  Priscilla's 
baby  came  like  the  last  drop  of  the 
expressed  sweetness  of  the  year,  when 
the  world  was  all  an  illumination  of 
gold  and  scarlet  glory. 

If  an  earthquake  had  moved  the 
ground  from  under  his  feet,  Mr.  Past- 
ner  would  have  been  no  more  con- 
99 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


founded  than  he  was  one  bright  Oc- 
tober day  by  a  telegram  from  Geoffrey : 
' '  Your  son  came  to-day.  Priscilla 
happy  with  her  baby.  Everything 
propitious.  Think  I  have  discovered 
a  new  force." 

A  new  force !  What  new  force  was 
needed  in  such  a  world  as  this?  His 
son !  Priscilla' s  baby !  For  an  instant 
his  feet  were  on  fire  to  go  to  her. 

But  what  was  this?  Priscilla  happy 
with  her  baby!  She  did  not  ask  for 
him ;  she  did  not  think  of  him ;  she  did 
not  say,  ' ' Come!"  He  had  declared  to 
her  that  she  would  never  see  him  till  she 
sent  for  him.  He  took  his  gun  and  went 
out  into  the  woods;  but  the  feathered 
things  might  have  alighted  on  that 
strong  arm;  the  snake  needed  not 
slip  away  from  that  powerful  tread; 
the  branches   could  bend  and  brush 

JOO 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

that  lordly  head  unfelt ;  with  this  great 
joy  and  awe  upon  him  he  could  not 
take  life,  he  who  had  given  life.  The 
mother-bears,  the  trembling  cubs,  the 
birds  starting  from  covert — they  were 
all  safe  that  day. 


IOI 


IV 


AS  for  Priscilla,  she  had  no  time  to 
•  think  of  Mr.  Pastner.  The  day 
was  not  long  enough  for  her  to  think 
of  her  baby  in.  She  was  well  and 
strong  and  about  again  very  shortly, 
in-doors  and  out,  the  color  in  her 
cheek,  the  splendor  on  her  hair,  the 
smile  on  her  lips,  and  always  her  baby 
in  her  arms — the  sleeping,  smiling 
baby,  the  baby  that  all  the  house  wor- 
shiped, and  that  old  Martha,  who  had 
never  left  Priscilla,  seemed  to  think  was 
the  first  child  ever  made.  Even  Geof- 
frey came  often  and  looked  at  it. 

"  Happy    little    devil!"    said  he. 
"Yes,  one  happy  thing  in  the  world, 
103 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


for  the  time  being.  He  has  n't  the 
soul  vexed  out  of  him  with  springs 
that  won't  spring,  with  electric  currents 
that  defy  him.  By  the  way,  I  think  I 
am  finding  out  how  to  photograph  the 
unseen  colors,  Priscilla  —  if  the  day 
were  twice  as  long,  and  I  could  spare 
the  time  from  my  main  purpose.  But 
the  thing  has  so  many  hitches;  it  is 
very  depressing,  Priscilla." 

To  photograph  unseen  colors !  What 
other  colors  were  needed  than  the 
damask  of  this  little  velvet  cheek,  the 
heaven-blue  of  these  big  eyes?  She 
was  so  full  of  the  joy  of  them  that  she 
had  not  even  the  power  to  feel  Geof- 
frey's depression,  that  once  would  have 
made  the  earth  dark  for  her.  She  had 
been  wandering  in  a  desert;  and  she 
had  suddenly  come  upon  waving  palms 
and  running  waters  and  blossoming 
io4 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

boughs  and  singing  birds.  She  sang 
like  a  bird  herself  to  her  baby  all  day 
long,  about  the  house  or  out  in  the 
snow,  where  she  fearlessly  carried  him, 
— songs  the  sweetness  of  which  no  pen 
might  even  note,  the  mere  bubblings  of 
happiness — if  it  were  really  happiness, 
and  not  a  sort  of  ecstatic  excitement. 

And  how  the  boy  grew!  How 
radiant  he  was — to  her  there  seemed 
to  be  a  very  nimbus  of  light  and  health 
about  him.  What  a  great  handsome 
cherub  of  a  child,  kicking  and  reaching 
and  crooning  and  cooing  in  the  fulness 
of  strength  and  life !  She  took  him  on 
her  arm,  one  mild  day  of  the  early 
spring,  and  went  through  the  great 
mansion  which,  unused  or  not,  the 
housekeeper  always  kept  in  such  per- 
fect order  that  a  particle  of  dust  find- 
ing itself  there  would  have  been  sure 
105 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


it  had  lost  its  way  and  have  hurried 
out  again.  She  had  never  stepped  over 
the  threshold  of  any  other  door  in  it 
than  those  of  her  own  room  and  Geof- 
frey's, and  the  parlors  and  dining-room 
of  the  lower  floor.  It  had  been  her 
prison  in  those  first  dreary  months. 
But  now  it  was  her  boy's  home,  her 
little  son's  possession;  he  must  see  it 
— she  would  see  it  with  him.  And 
throned  on  her  arm  he  went  with  her  into 
the  great  library  and  the  music-room 
beyond,  from  which  the  grand  piano 
had  been  wheeled  for  her  use  into  the 
drawing-room,  looking  at  the  marbles, 
the  bronzes,  the  paintings,  taking  the 
cover  from  the  gilded  harp,  and  run- 
ning her  fingers  through  the  strings,  to 
the  child's  apparent  pleasure;  for  al- 
ready he  loved  music. 

She  went  on,   into  the  chambers 
1 06 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


above,  and  into  the  great  attic  where 
lay  the  innumerable  playthings  of  an- 
other child — the  skates,  the  sleds,  the 
velocipede,  the  drawing-table,  the 
tools,  the  lathe,  the  sword  and  spear 
and  shield  of  his  own  young  carving, 
the  books  that  other  child  used  to 
read,  the  pipe  he  used  to  blow  tunes 
out  of. 

Then  Priscilla  came  down  to  the 
room  that  had  been  the  sitting-room 
of  her  child's  great-grandmother,  a 
room  lined  with  old  portraits  of  the 
dead  and  gone  Pastners,  with  their 
calm,  proud,  fair  faces.  Would  her 
boy  be  as  strong,  as  fine  as  they?  The 
question  struck  her  suddenly,  had  she 
taken  the  pains  to  make  him  so  by  first 
making  herself  all  that  was  noble  ?  And 
just  as  suddenly  she  asked  herself 
could  she  make  him  this,  she  alone  and 
107 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

without  help?  And  she  held  him  so 
closely,  half-smothering  him  with  her 
swift  caresses,  that  the  little  fellow  cried 
out ;  and  going  into  the  next  room  she 
was  obliged  to  sit  down  and  pacify 
him. 

It  was  the  room  which  had  belonged 
especially  to  her  husband's  mother. 
It  had  been  hung  long  since  in  tapes- 
tries, of  pale  blues  and  greens,  in  a  de- 
sign of  scrolls  and  vases  and  flowers; 
and  there  were  old  Jacobite  tables  and 
consoles  there  of  tarnished  silver,  on 
which  lay  some  miniatures,  painted  in 
pale  water-colors.  It  had  about  it  an 
indescribable  atmosphere  of  cool  and 
innocent  refinement.  From  its  bal- 
conied windows  stretched  a  wide  ring  of 
distant  purple  mountain-peaks  touched 
with  gold,  and  a  valley  view  where, 
through  sunbeams,  the  darkest  tinges 
1 08 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


of  verdure  melted  into  deep  violet,  and 
a  green  and  purple  sea  of  hills  seemed 
to  toss  below,  now  and  then,  all  the 
world  of  soft  rich  sheen  and  color,  as  a 
shower  or  a  cloud  passed  over,  spanned 
by  a  fleeting  rainbow. 

But  it  was  not  the  view,  of  course, 
that  had  suddenly  hushed  the  child's 
crying.  She  looked  about  her  to  find 
what  it  was  he  saw  that  so  pleased 
him.  His  tearful  eyes  were  shining 
like  violets  wet  with  dew,  his  mouth 
was  open  with  a  glad  cry,  his  arms 
were  lifted  toward  a  portrait  on  the 
wall — the  full  length  portrait  of  her 
husband.  There  George  Pastner 
stood,  as  some  artist  had  placed  him, 
in  the  pride  of  his  young  manhood, 
the  bloom  of  youth  on  his  face,  the 
light  on  his  thick,  fair  locks,  his  eagle 
eye  softened  by  the  irradiating  smile, 
109 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


almost  stepping  from  the  frame,  like 
some  proud  young  Viking,  with  his 
lofty  stature  and  his  haughty  head. 
4 'Did  the  child  know  his  father?"  she 
was  saying  then.  Oh,  no,  of  course 
not ;  that  was  absurd,  that  was  impos- 
sible !  He  only  saw  a  piece  of  splendid 
color,  and  he  saw,  too,  perhaps,  a  re- 
markably vivid  presentment  of  youth 
and  courage,  of  a  strong  and  noble 
man,  he  who  had  hitherto  seen  only 
the  servants,  the  wizened  little  village 
doctor,  the  dwarf  wheeled  about  in  his 
chair. 

But  Priscilla  herself  —  she  knew 
him.  She  gazed  at  him  all  at  once 
with  a  new  recognition,  too.  Those 
eyes  seemed  to  be  meeting  hers;  those 
lips  were  about  to  part  to  speak  to  her; 
that  smile  was  for  her — oh,  perhaps  for 
her  and  his  boy !    A  thrill  shot  through 


no 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


her  from  head  to  foot — a  sudden,  un- 
expected, unwished-for  thrill — a  wild, 
sweet  thrill  that  made  her  hide  her 
eyes  in  the  little  silken  threads  of  the 
child's  thin  curls,  and  then  hurry  from 
the  room  with  him,  as  if  the  eyes  of  the 
portrait  saw  and  knew  it  all.  For  it 
was  he  who  had  given  her  the  treasure 
of  her  child. 

But  she  came  back  into  that  room 
later  in  the  day,  alone,  when  the  west- 
ern sunbeam  lay  full  upon  the  portrait, 
bringing  out  the  innermost  secrets  of 
its  power.  She  came  into  it  by  lamp- 
light, holding  the  lamp  over  her  head 
so  that  she  might  throw  another  light 
on  it  and  yet  new  expression.  She 
came  back  the  next  day,  and  then,  she 
could  hardly  have  said  why,  every  day, 
and  many  times  a  day. 

One  morning  she  took  out  all  the 
in 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


letters  that  she  had  had  from  her  hus- 
band—  those  which  she  had  hardly 
read  at  all  at  first,  those  which  began 
to  command  her  attention,  those  for 
which  she  had  come  to  look — and  she 
read  them  through  again — gentle,  calm, 
kind  letters,  taking  everything  as  a 
matter  of  course,  sending  always  now 
a  message  to  the  last  Pastner.  "My 
love  to  my  little  child,"  he  said  in  one. 
"Kiss  my  dear  boy  for  me,"  said  an- 
other. "Say  for  me,  sometimes,  if  you 
can,  a  kind  word  to  my  son."  What 
sort  of  a  man  was  he,  she  wondered 
then,  not  to  hate  her,  not  to  punish  her, 
not  to  take  the  child  away  from  her,  as 
he  could  ?  She  bent  over  the  crib,  where 
the  child  slept  among  his  lawns  and 
laces,  in  an  agony  of  emotion,  of  love 
for  him,  of  fear  for  herself,  of  confusion, 
alarm,  of  joy,  of  she  knew  not  what. 


112 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

She  took  the  boy  with  her  into  that 
room  which  had  become  like  an  ora- 
tory. What  was  this  she  was  doing 
with  the  child  who  already  had  begun 
to  lisp  "mamma?" — she  was  teaching 
him  to  look  at  the  portrait  and  say 
"papa."  She  never  let  him  quite 
touch  the  portrait ;  she  held  him  away 
from  it,  but  on  this  side  and  on  that ;  she 
raised  or  lowered  a  shade  to  change  the 
aspect  and  glance;  she  had  him  ob- 
serve the  luminous  eye  following  him, 
the  glad  smile  greeting  him.  She 
tried  to  make  it  seem  a  live  and  breath- 
ing thing  to  the  boy;  a  man,  a  friend, 
a  protector,  stepping  from  that  sun- 
beam to  their  side,  one  to  be  joyously 
welcomed — even  to  a  baby's  compre- 
hension a  something  above  and  beyond 
and  dear.  The  child,  she  reasoned, 
should  have  some  ideal  of  loftiness  for 
113 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


his  standard.  If  he  never  did  in  his 
life  anything  with  the  thought  of  which 
he  could  not  meet  those  searching 
eyes!  Her  boy,  with  his  storms  and 
tempers  and  loves,  his  strong  individu- 
ality, who  ought  to  have  a  father  to 
keep  him  safe!  How  many  of  the 
race  there  had  been  for  him  to  be 
proud  of — the  old  soldier  with  his 
sword,  the  first  of  the  line  since  it  left 
the  Swedish  shore;  the  old  minister 
with  his  angelic  brow  the  last !  If  this, 
the  fourth  George  Pastner,  should 
bring  disrepute  upon  them  because  his 
mother  had  kept  from  him  the  father 
whose  strength  of  nature  and  inheri- 
tance of  law  could  have  held  him  true 
to  his  race  and  name ! 

At  other  times  Priscilla  thought  it 
would  be  no  harm  to  read  the  letters 
her  husband  had  written  to  his  mother, 
n4 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

when  a  boy,  the  letters  she  had  written 
him ;  they  might  teach  her  how  to  direct 
this  child  of  their  blood  and  likeness. 
It  seemed  as  if  she  were  reading  some 
sacred  poem  in  the  story  of  that  inno- 
cent youth  and  tender  mother's  care, 
the  boy  away  at  school,  on  journeys 
with  his  father,  first  seeing  the  great 
world  outside.  He  had  taken  her  to 
one  of  the  very  places  mentioned  in  the 
later  letters ;  she  saw  how  much  it  had 
meant  to  him,  and  how  she  had  ruined 
it. 

One  day,  at  last,  the  baby  was  play- 
ing in  his  bath,  the  wet  rings  of  his 
hair  making  a  glory  in  the  sunlight 
that  overlay  the  glowing  little  face  and 
glistening  in  all  the  water-drops  of  his 
splashing.  What  a  pleasure  it  was  to 
see  him,  to  hear  his  inarticulate  cries 
of  joy,  to  seize  him  and  take  him  out, 
115 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


struggling  and  lifting  up  his  voice  in 
rebellion!  "Papa!  papa!"  she  said, 
commandingly.  And  the  child  stopped 
his  outcry  and  began  babbling  the 
same  sound,  eager  to  be  taken  to  the 
portrait.  And  all  in  a  breath  it  rushed 
over  Priscilla  that  she  was  guilty  of 
an  unspeakable  outrage  in  keeping 
such  a  rapture  as  the  daily  sight  and 
sound  and  care  of  this  child  from  his 
father. 

Geoffrey  had  left  his  work-room  one 
evening  some  days  later,  and  was  sit- 
ting at  the  piano  when  Priscilla  came 
down  to  dinner.  He  was  in  one  of 
his  despairs,  which  were  as  frequent 
with  him  as  his  triumphs — indeed, 
rather  more  so.  The  thing  he  sought 
perpetually  eluded  him — it  was  just 
before  him.  He  could  put  his  hand  on 
it ;  it  was  not  there ;  but  mocking  him, 
116 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

escaping  him,  giving  him  flying 
glimpses  of  glorious  hope,  ever  going 
on  before.  It  seemed  to  him  now  that 
he  should  live  his  whole  worthless  life 
over  that  model,  yet  never  attain  his 
end ;  and  he  was  pouring  his  sorrows 
out  at  the  piano,  as  few  knew  how 
better  than  Geoffrey.  It  was  his  woe- 
begone playing  which  always  would 
quiet  the  little  George  when  any  too 
great  excitement  set  his  nerves  danc- 
ing. Priscilla  had  left  the  playing  to 
Geoffrey,  seldom  touching  the  piano 
herself  if  he  were  around,  thinking  it 
was  only  justice  to  let  him  have  some  of 
the  divine  happiness  of  giving  pleasure 
to  the  household  idol.  She  sang  to 
the  boy,  to  be  sure,  sang  loud  and 
sweet  and  clear  the  best  she  knew; 
sometimes  when  she  carried  him  out- 
doors and  singing  so,  it  might  have 
117 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


seemed  like  angels'  voices  echoing 
from  scaur  to  scaur. 

"You  will  deafen  the  child,"  said 
Geoffrey,  meeting  her  as  he  wheeled 
himself  through  one  of  the  garden 
walks,  coming  from  his  work-room. 

"He  likes  it,"  laughed  Priscilla. 
And  then  she  remembered  how  Geof- 
frey had  tried  to  influence  her  fancy 
toward  George  Pastner  once  by  vis- 
ions of  the  training  her  voice  could 
have  with  his  money. 

"I  declare,"  said  Geoffrey,  looking 
at  her  severely,  "I  never  would  have 
believed  a  little  thing  could  have  made 
such  a  difference  in  you — " 

"He  is  not  a  little  thing!"  cried 
Priscilla,  indignantly,  the  red  starting 
to  her  cheek.  "Yes,  he  is!  A  dear 
little  thing!  A  darling  little  thing! 
His  mother's  — " 

118 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


"You  are  entirely  lost  in  him!"  her 
brother  exclaimed,  angrily. 

' '  I  should  n't  think  you  cared  for  him 
at  all !"  she  cried.  "Your  own  nephew!" 

"The  boy  is  well  enough,  quite  well 
enough;  very  promising.  And  I  am 
thankful  every  time  I  see  him  that  he 
has  n't  a  hunched  back  or  a  club- 
foot—" 

"Geoffrey!  " 

"But  he  will  have,  if  you  go  climb- 
ing round  on  these  mountain  paths 
with  him  the  way  you  do.  The  very 
dogs  who  follow  you  disapprove  of  it. 
And  as  for  me,  once  I  could  command 
your  attention  a  moment.  Now  I 
might  discover  how  to  write  messages 
to  Mars  on  space,  and  it  would  n't  in- 
terest you  so  much  as  the  fact  that  the 
baby  has  two  little  teeth  almost 
through.  More  than  that,  you  have 
119 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


degenerated  to  such  an  extent  it 
would  n't  interest  you  in  the  least." 

"Oh,  Geoffrey,  do  you  think  so?" 
And  she  laid  the  child  in  the  grass  and 
stood  pleadingly  with  her  hands  on 
the  wheel-chair.  "Oh,  you  know  bet- 
ter," she  said.  "You  know  I  am  as 
eager  for  your  success  as  you  are.  But 
the  baby  is  such  a  surprise  to  me ;  he 
is  such  a  care,  too — such  a  pleasure. 
And  you  know  I  have  so  little  other 
pleasure — " 

"So  little  pleasure!"  roared  Geof- 
frey. "You,  full  of  health  and  well- 
being  and  winning  looks  and  fine  possi- 
bilities, with  so  little  pleasure!  You, 
with  a  fortune  to  spend,  a  prince  for  a 
husband !  Where  is  your  husband, 
Priscilla?  What  is  he  staying  away  for 
like  this?  It  is  beginning  to  excite 
remark.  It  may  be  business,  but  it  is 
1 20 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


very  queer  business.  Have  you  had  a 
falling  out,  Priscilla?  I  ask  you,  have 
you  had  a  falling  out?" 

"How  could  we  have  a  falling  out?" 
faltered  Priscilla.  "My  poor,  dear 
boy,"  she  said  then,  carrying  the  war 
into  Africa,  "  you  are  completely  tired 
with  your  hard  study.  Why  do  n't 
you  put  it  away  a  little  while?" 

' '  Put  it  away  !  Put  my  life  and  soul 
and  hope  and  joy  and  sorrow  away! 
Why  do  n't  you  put  your  baby  away?" 

"Put  my  baby  away!"  cried  Pris- 
cilla, running  to  catch  him  up.  "But, 
Geoffrey,  dear,"  she  said,  as  she  ran, 
"it  would  really  do  you  good — the 
change — and  rest  your  brain.  And 
you  could  come  back  to  that  thing — " 

"That  thing!  It 's  a  dozen  things!" 

"Well,  to  all  of  those  problems,  and 
see   your   way    straight    to  conquer 

121 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


them,  if  you  would  go  away — would 
go  down  to  see  George — " 

"In  that  North  Carolina  gold  mine? 
I?" 

"And  bring  him  back  with  you," 
said  Priscilla,  rosy  to  the  nape  of  her 
neck. 

"That  isn't  the  sort  of  rest  my 
brain  needs.  It  needs  sympathy  and 
encouragement  and  the  influx  of  new 
thought.  And  the  person  who  gave 
me  all  these,  you,  for  some  unaccount- 
able reason,  are  the  means  of  keeping 
away  from  me!  You  had  better  take 
your  boy  and  do  it  yourself !"  said 
Geoffrey,  wheeling  off  in  high  dud- 
geon. 

That  was  some  days  since.  This 
evening  Geoffrey  was  in  the  drawing- 
room  playing  a  little  prelude  of  Cho- 
pin's that  was  nothing  but  a  memory, 

122 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


a  sob,  and  a  sigh.  Priscilla,  coming  into 
the  room,  went  up  behind  him  as  he 
sat,  extending  her  hands  over  his, 
effacing  his,  and  played  the  gay  meas- 
ure of  a  minuet,  that  presently  changed 
to  a  march,  the  wedding  march  of 
Lohengrin.  "Elsa  did  not  know  the 
god  in  her  husband,  though,"  she 
said.  "Do  you  hear  it?"  she  cried. 
"It  is  the  tread  of  glad  feet!  It  is  my 
happiness  on  the  way  to  me." 

"I  wish  it  were  mine,"  said  Geof- 
frey. 

"Oh,  it  is  that,  too,  I  hope,"  said 
Priscilla. 

She  had  written  a  letter  that  day,  a 
very  brief  letter.  "My  dear  hus- 
band," it  ran,  "  will  you  come  to  your 
boy  and  your  wife,  Priscilla?" 

But  when  that  first  impetuous  rush 
of  feeling,  that  first  impulse  and  action, 
123 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

had  subsided,  a  great  doubt  took  pos- 
session of  Priscilla.  She  grew  pale 
suffering  it.  She  had  kept  him  away 
so  long.  What  if  he  did  not  choose  to 
come?  What  if  he  had  no  more  con- 
cern for  the  woman  who  had  allowed 
him  to  deceive  himself,  who  in  truth 
had  deceived  him  herself  in  letting  him 
marry  her  while  she  yet  reeled  under 
the  blow  that  had  stunned  her  and 
struck  dead,  as  she  had  thought  then, 
her  power  for  love  or  passion,  who  had 
made  herself  an  incubus  on  his  life, 
had  driven  him  from  his  home,  held 
him  bound  with  a  chain  that  by  this 
time  he  might  be  wanting  to  break? 
She  wished  she  could  go  to  sleep  till 
the  week  was  over  that  it  would  take 
that  letter  to  reach  her  husband,  that 
it  would  take  a  reply  from  him  to 
come  to  her.  Even  the  boy  in  those 
124 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 

hard  days  seemed  to  realize  that  some- 
thing out  of  the  common  was  in  the  air, 
was  on  the  way,  that  something  ailed 
his  mother;  he  would  look  at  her  face 
bewildered,  and,  putting  up  a  grieved 
lip,  reach  his  little  hands  to  smooth 
her  cheek,  or  nestle  against  it  with 
the  baby  kisses  of  his  little  wet  mouth. 

"Priscilla, "  said  Geoffrey,  "you  are 
more  restless  than  the  wind !  You 
seem  to  have  divined  the  secret  of  per- 
petual motion.  Either  you  must  get 
yourself  quiet,  or  I  must  go  some- 
where else  with  my  work."  It  was 
evident,  now,  as  always,  that  Mr. 
Geoffrey  felt  not  at  all  that  he  was 
there  because  of  Priscilla,  but  that 
Priscilla  was  there  because  of  him. 
And  if  here  any  one  had  reminded 
Geoffrey  of  the  pauper's  threat  of  run- 
ning away  from  the  almshouse  if  affairs 
125 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


were  not  better  conducted  there,  he 
would  have  failed  to  see  any  relevance 
in  the  remark.  Nor  would  Priscilla  have 
seen  it — until  to-day.  It  was  for  Geof- 
frey's sake  that  she  had  come  here — to 
put  the  means  at  his  command  that  he 
needed;  if  also  to  repay  to  Mr.  Pastner 
the  debt  they  had  incurred  for  the  sav- 
ing of  Geoffrey's  life  and  of  his  model; 
and  so  again  for  Geoffrey's  sake.  But 
to-day,  even  over  her  love  of  the  forlorn 
and  hapless  brother,  pulsed  something 
stronger.  She  was  here  because  she 
was  the  child's  mother!  Her  head 
was  high  and  her  color  was  rich ;  she 
was  here  because  she  was  George  Past- 
ner's  wife!  And  then  the  color  fell — 
a  poor  mockery  of  a  wife,  to  whom  per- 
haps her  husband  might  never  return ! 

The  balmy  air  of  the  mild  day  was 
perfect ;  if  it  blew  over  Syrian  gardens 
126 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


and  thickets  of  roses  it  would  have 
been  no  blander.,  no  sweeter;  the 
heaven  wore  its  deepest  blue,  the  sun- 
shine sparkled  over  every  leaf  and 
spray  and  lay  on  a  world  of  apple- 
bloom  below  the  parapet.,  and  made 
lanes  of  gold  down  azure-green  and 
purple  hollows  of  the  hills.  Priscilla, 
carrying  her  baby,  a  scarf  of  blue  gauze 
wrapped  round  them  both,  moving 
down  between  the  hedges,  was  only 
an  impersonation  of  all  the  flowers  and 
beauty  and  splendor  of  the  morning. 
She  left  the  garden,  and  descended  the 
path  between  the  young  birches  just 
trembling  with  tender  green ;  a  blue- 
bird dropped  a  warble  of  joy  over  her; 
the  brook  ran  like  a  far  sweet  song 
below. 

The  stage  had  just  gone  toiling 
along  the  highway  at  the  foot  of  the 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


hill.  She  fancied  it  had  stopped  a 
minute  or  two,  she  could  not  say. 

She  went  on  more  quickly  down  the 
hill,  her  heart  beating  all  over  her  it 
seemed.  Suddenly  at  a  new  sound, 
a  crackle  of  a  bush,  a  footstep  coming 
nearer,  a  tread  that  had  the  beat  of  the 
music  of  the  wedding  march  in  her  ear, 
she  stood  aside  behind  the  screen  of 
birch  and  vine,  the  baby  reaching  for 
the  boughs  in  the  sunshine  with  a  glad 
babble  that  her  kisses  did  not  hush. 
The  traveler  came  up  and  might  have 
passed ;  her  quick  breath  made  it  im- 
possible to  move  again.  And  then  she 
summoned  her  strength  and  separated 
the  tangle,  stepped  out  upon  the  path, 
confronting  him  in  silence,  with  the 
child  upon  her  arm,  beautiful  as  some 
young  madonna,  with  her  bloom,  her 
sweetness,  her  great  solemn  eyes. 
128 


PRISCILLA'S  LOVE-STORY 


For  a  moment  Pastner  stopped,  his 
hat  in  his  hand.  The  vision  was  too 
radiant ;  it  seemed  to  him  a  dream. 
Meeting  those  eyes,  he  hardly  dared 
breathe,  dared  hope. 

"Papa!  papa!"  cried  the  child,  joy- 
ously, lifting  his  little  arms  as  he  was 
wont  toward  the  portrait  in  the  house. 
And  then  he  had  clasped  wife  and  son 
in  his  embrace. 

"Oh,"  whispered  Priscilla,  "is  it 
true?    Do  you  love  me  still?" 

"Forever!"  he  exclaimed.  "And 
you?    Oh,  Priscilla!  " 

"I  think,"  said  Priscilla,  looking 
down,  and  then  her  whole  soul  pouring 
in  a  blaze  from  her  blue  eyes  to  his, 
"that  I  have  never  loved  any  one 
else." 

And  the  three  went  on  together  to 
their  home. 

129 


PRINTED  AT  THE  LAKESIDE  PRESS 
BY  R.  R.  DONNELLEY  AND  SONS 
COMPANY,   CHICAGO,  MDCCCXCVIII 


iniiilip 

D01329303L 


PRISCILMS 

LOVE  STORY 

HARRIETS 
PRESCOTT 


SPOFF0RD 

